


Small World

by CrescentMoonDemon



Category: Dream Daddy: A Dad Dating Simulator
Genre: Alternate Universe - Werewolf, Angst with a Happy Ending, Cryptids, Cryptids Everywhere, Fluff and Smut, Friends to Lovers, Just Lots of Sex Later, M/M, Mutual Pining, Non-Penetrative Sex, Oral Sex, Robert is a treasure and we must protect him, Slow Burn, Smut, So much smut, Teratophilia, This Is Why We Can't Have Nice Things, Werewolf Culture, dads just trying to do their best
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-07-28
Updated: 2018-02-01
Packaged: 2018-12-08 03:36:59
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 14
Words: 83,277
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11638131
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/CrescentMoonDemon/pseuds/CrescentMoonDemon
Summary: Hindsight is 20/20, and it's easy to see what could have gone differently looking back. But the past can't be changed, and mistakes are here to stay. The hardest part isn't just living with them; it's facing the consequences.





	1. Hit and Run

**Author's Note:**

> **SLAMS THE DOOR DOWN**
> 
> I fuckin told you guys on Tumblr I needed the thing! And ya'll fuckers probably thought I was jokiiiiiing!?!!! Well I went and did the thing myself so here it is! ENJOY!
> 
> **GENTLY FIXES THE DOOR**

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Descriptions of John will be kept vague so readers can project their own Dadsona onto him, but you can follow [this link](http://crescentmoondemon.tumblr.com/post/165566760598#notes) for John’s canon appearance.
> 
> The [Terminology Master Post](http://crescentmoondemon.tumblr.com/post/165422480878#notes) features a comprehensive guide to pieces of language, cryptids, and other pertinent info featured in the story. It will be updated as the story progresses, so check in regularly!

Tonight was meant to be peaceful. A run through the woods. Amanda understood, was prepared to lay out interference should anyone come calling. “McFridayz struck again,” was to be my excuse: a harmless story of a gnarly case of food poisoning while giving the greasy fast-food chain another chance at being appetizing. “No-can-do tonight, my fine Sir. It’s a bad scene in there. Pops has been praying to the Porcelain Throne all afternoon and there’s no sign of stopping. Might turn into a cult at this rate. Can I take a message, though? Y’know, when he’s not hurling all over the bathroom floor?”

My dadly pride would have to scrape by after that blow, but embarrassing stories are more believable in a pinch. Besides, food poisoning happens to the best of us.

I cringe at the thought that Joseph might be among the story’s recipients, though. Would violent retching being compared to prayer offend him? Dang, I really hope not. The confidences we shared in Margarita Zone proved he wasn’t the easily-offended type, at least, but a youth pastor is still a pastor. And a friend. A good friend. A _really_ good friend.

Damn—language, John!—that is one complicated web I want nothing to do with unravelling tonight.

Not tonight.

Tonight is meant to be peaceful. A long run through the woods—which, thanks to Craig, runs are getting to be longer and more refreshing. Look at the stars, breathe in the cool spring air, maybe run down a buck. But tonight isn’t a night for hunting. Relax. Breathe.

Run.

That’s the game. Just run. Run and don’t stop.

_Don’t stop._

Rushing wind ruffles my fur like grass bending to a hurricane as I hurdle into the moonlit dark; it cools the undercoat, and on muggy nights if I can stomach the humidity it’s so dang _nice_. The moon is high, now. Pale streaks of light reach for me through the shuddering canopy to caress its fingers through my mane. My tongue lolls from the side my mouth like a streamer but I don’t bother to pull it in. No one is here to see. I can do as I please. _Cut loose,_ I tell myself, but even in this perfect seclusion I hesitate. What if someone’s camping nearby? There’s a road near here, what if someone hears? What if someone _sees_?

Don’t think about it. Not tonight. _When was the last time you go to run like this?_ I ask myself. Not recently enough, and it’s eating me up inside.

Just run. Don’t think. Don’t stop.

Saliva froths into foam as my lungs pound through hammered breaths, forepaws grasping soft earth and sturdy roots while my hindpaws shove off at a full gallop, and with a soaring in my stomach I vault a low row of brush dividing two game trails, scaring the fluffy tail right off a wild bunny. It’s an adorable flash of brown and white, petrified as it must be, and in the barest instant there’s a bright flare of _chase it catch it eat it_ , but it’s gone the second my claws connect with the packed earth. I could run it down, sniff it back to its burrow, make a morsel of it, but the hunger I feel is not for the meat, only the chase, and a bunny isn’t nearly satisfying prey.

I tear through the woods like evil itself is after me, ears flattened against the roaring wind, the glow of a nearly full moon casting the forest in a striking white that catches my eyes and lights up the world like broad daylight. Any other night, this darkness would terrify me; human eyes cannot see in this. But not tonight. Tonight, wolf eyes gleam like green-gold mirrors illuminating the path as I fly over it, claws barely touching the ground.  


Tonight belongs to the wolf. 

Tonight belongs to _me_.

I let loose a bellowing howl that vibrates all the atoms of the world. The stars tremble brightly overhead, the trees sway to my tune, and the moon sings brilliantly back to me in a duet as old as nature itself.

A small herd of deer scatter when I burst into their meadow. Three does and a buck scramble, high-tailed, into three different directions. A sparking flash of instinct takes me after the lone doe. She’s fast. Needle thin hooves bound at break-neck speeds through underbrush too dense for me to navigate, so I skirt the edges. She’s smart thinking she can outmaneuver me in there. This isn’t her first rodeo, but neither is it mine.

She knows these woods. She has agility, but she’s upwind of me, and I have tenacity. I have momentum.

I plow through the undergrowth at the side of the game trail where she leaps in shock, twisting midair as if to alter her path over the ground, but she fails. Leaps, but never exceeds the reach of my claws.

I blast beneath her, haunches grazing her flailing hock. She bolts into the direction her herd ran off to. Whether she knows this, I can’t tell. She’s just an animal, but she’ll find them. They always do.

Ahead, the forest thins out slightly then comes to an abrupt end at the road. I slam to a halt just short of it, claws stealing my momentum by digging furrows into the trunk of an old birch tree. Separated by twenty feet of open air and maybe six inches of underbrush, I vault back around the tree in time to outmaneuver the peripheral shine of headlights as a sedan full of whooping youths screeches by to the thunderous bass of something that can’t possibly be considered music.

Their headlights streak past, and as I stand panting just behind the tree it’s then that I notice a familiar heap of metal, red as much from rust as paint, its lights and engine off. The pickup sits quietly at the city overlook, peacefully at rest with no sign of its driver.

I crouch low, giving my lungs the time they need to control themselves, and scan up and down the tree line as far as the view goes, but there’s no sign of Robert. His scent isn’t on this side of the road, but if he’s near the truck he isn’t sitting up. The heck? Did he fall asleep in the bed or something?

Under normal circumstances—and that’s to say any circumstance, really—I’d make a phone call, shoot a message over Dadbook, or go up and check things out for myself. As it stands, my cellphone is back at the trailhead with my clothes, computer’s at home, and everything about my current state makes waltzing up to peer into the bed of Robert Small’s pickup truck one of the worst ideas I could possibly have. And not just because he’s likely to be whittling his way through a tiny dog sculpture with a knife kept sharp by near constant use. More because I’m liable to send the rugged heartthrob into cardiac arrest. And _then_ get stabbed.

But my dad senses are not relegated by what form I take, and I cannot deny a pang of concern at being unable to locate my friend. He could be hurt. Hit by a car maybe? Jeez, I try not to think about that one. Looking both ways, I lower myself down the steep embankment on all fours, praying the high grass is tall enough to conceal me, and scuttle fleet footed to the other side of the two-lane road and dive for cover below the truck’s ancient side paneling. Good, he’s not under the truck. That would be awkward.

Boot prints have left ruffle marks in the sand beneath the driver’s side door, lead around to the passenger side, and back to the hitch where he must have climb in, and the same tread marks go away from the truck and back a number of times, but their freshness is obscured by various other tracks. Mostly those of a small dog if the scent and shape are right. Robert’s scent is all around his truck; it’s impossible to miss. Sweat, leather, cigarette smoke, and whiskey. A lot of whiskey. 

Did he drive out here like that? I deadpan a growl to myself just thinking of it, deciding on the spot that if I locate his keys I’m hiding them in a place he won’t find until morning.

My ears prick and pivot, standing tall to funnel sounds towards them as I sniff my way around the truck, keeping low on all fours. A rustling from inside draws my attention, and I lay my ears flat as, slowly, I raise up on hind feet and peer cautiously into the cab. Heart racing, I duck swiftly after the barest glimpse and breathe a muted sigh to have found it vacant. The rustle comes again, and this time I inch my way back to the rear. There is no mistaking the movement this time.

_This is a very bad idea,_ strikes me with all the blaring intonations of an Olympic gong. I can scarcely fathom how bad of an idea this is. How many ways this could go south for me, for him, for Amanda and the rest of the community, but. . . .

He’s still my friend. I need to be sure he’s okay.

I haven’t seen Robert since he brought me up here the first time, and, well, maybe it’s because I miss him, and I worry. I’m a dad. It’s what I do, and that doesn’t change with my appearance.

Crouched low beside the corner of the open tailgate, I let my hand balance on the back tire, mindful that claws on metal can make a sound, and with the slow, deliberate caution cultivated over decades of careful hunts, peer in from the lowest corner of the tailgate.

Nothing.

What—? Oh! 

An adorable boston terrier lies there on a small bed, curled belly-up as if awaiting pats from the heavens themselves in the sleepy, curved posture of a blissfully napping pooch. The bone shaped tag on her spiky collar reads Betsy. Wasn’t the Betsy from Robert’s story a Pitbull? Another embellishment, I decide, or maybe this is just Betsy II: Back in Boston.

_What a good girl,_ I think, tail wagging faster than it has any right to.

Strewn about the bed are a medley of wood shavings and various bottles of different types of booze, mainly whiskey and a couple bourbon, and one uncapped bottle stands mostly full right alongside the sleeping terrier. I frown in a way that pins my ears back and raises the corner of a lip over my teeth; that won’t do. If Betsy were to tip it over and drink some, it would poison her!

I go around the opposite side of the truck for a better reach, stretching up over the top of the railing to grab the bottle next to Betsy without disturbing her, and get two claws around the neck when—

_Snap!_

My ears shoot up, hackles raised. I whirl my head around, eyes wide.

Robert stands maybe twenty feet back, eyes and mouth agape, ombre skin pale as fresh snow.

_Oh, crap. Oh crap oh crap oh crap **oh crap**!_

My heart leaps into my throat, and I reflexively jerk back. Forgetting the bottle in my hand, it clangs into the side of the bed and falls, clattering cacophonously into a pile of other empty bottles. Betsy leaps awake with a frightened yelp, gets one look at me, and bolts for the back of the pickup with her tail between her legs yapping and squealing with all the terror of a flock of parakeets fleeing a jaguar. It cuts me just to see the little thing so scared, heart breaking in my chest because it’s _me_ that’s frightened her so badly.

“Get away from my dog!”

_Oh, CRAP!_

I wheel back on Robert. He’s no closer, but now his hands aren’t empty and anger is seeping through the tarrying mask of fear. He’s got his knife, and while I know implicitly it can’t kill me I have no desire to be stabbed on a backcountry road. I back away from the truck on hind feet, inching towards the road and the forest beyond, hands raised in the nearest approximation of a “put-the-knife-down” pantomime as giant, clawed, furry forepaws will allow.

I take on step back. He takes two forward.

Not good. Bluff or no bluff, he’s got to be drunk to be this reckless. Robert may be armed with a knife and a bellyful of courage, but he’s still staring down eight feet of claws and teeth in a cryptic amalgamation of man and wolf in two-tone black and gray fur and the physique of a ripped Shaquille O’Neal—not that I have much to brag about in human form. I look like the absolute _last_ thing you want to challenge in the middle of absolute nowhere with no one else around.

And the way he’s staring me in the eyes, there’s no way he’s thinking clearly. It prickles the fur on my back, and my hackles raise higher to reflexively meet the challenge, my upper lip pulling back over my teeth.

_Just back off, Robert,_ I think desperately. _Don’t be this dumb, come on, you know better!_

Or, maybe he doesn’t? Not when he’s drunk? Would I react this way in his shoes if it were Amanda? Yeesh, I’d probably be worse.

Oh dear, he’s getting closer.

I go the bluff route, too, and bark a snarl at him before he can take another step, showing off upper and lower teeth this time. It does the trick apparently and snaps him out of whatever protective impulse is egging him on. His resolve falters enough that I take my chance, drop back to all fours, and dart across the road, haul myself up the embankment, and right into the relative safety of the dense undergrowth. 

Most of me wants to run home as fast as my feet will carry me and pretend this never happened, but there’s another part, just as strong, that wants to make sure this numbskull doesn’t try to follow me and get lost in the woods or, equally bad, try driving home utterly sloshed and high on adrenaline. Not good options for either of us, and as I circle farther up the tree line and peer low through the cover of night darkened foliage I spot him easy. He’s standing halfway into the road—yeah, he’s hammered—and staring into the spot I went through, at his hands, the knife, the tree line, his hands again, shakes his head, rubs his neck, rubs his eyes, and goes back to staring.

I notice the headlights first.

He’ll see them and move. He’s not that drunk.

Not _that_ drunk? He stared down a werewolf like a WWE wrestler stares down a grade school bully and didn’t so much as bat an eye! Over a dog! A cute dog, granted, but still a dog!

But the engine roars and the high beams are on, surely he sees it?

Robert is still caught between rubbing his eyes and gawking into the night. Surely he knows it’s—

_Oh SHIT!_

I don’t think. 

Over the roar of the engine, blaring horn, and screeching tires, I tear past the blinding glare of headlights and plough the stunned figure of Robert Small out of its path. There is a flash of feeling sorry for how hard I must have hit him and enough sense to tuck my tail in as the hurricane of wind the truck makes roars by me, barely grazing my right haunch, and curl instinctively around him and twist midair. When we hit the hardtop, I take the brunt of the impact on one shoulder and roll with it, pushing through the cramp in my hand to dig my claws in the ground and drag him by the scruff of his leather jacket _away_ from the goddamn street.

Between the scramble and the once-limp now violently struggling man shoving at me, I lose my footing and flop into the dusty ground of the overlook and roll away. I come up in a crouch several feet from him, and only then do I realize something came _with_ the cramp as Robert scrambles away. He’s staring— _right at me_ —but that takes a backseat to the . . . knife sticking out of my hand.

Oh.

_Oh._

Oh, wow, blood is _so_ not my thing.

My stomach churns with that horrible sick feeling I still associate with McFridayz, and before I can second guess the move I squint my eyes shut and yank the blade free. The sound I make is undignified at best: a yelp on par with the keen of a dying rabbit. The knife falls where it likes, streaked with and surrounded by small spatters of red, and I clutch my hand to stub the flow and look, wide-eyed, at Robert. The first thing I note is that he seems perfectly fine, a little dirty and what looks like a skinned palm, but apparently no worse than an eight-year-old might look falling off a bike.

He’s gaping at me like I really did try to eat his dog.

The truck finishes shrieking to a halt not far ahead, and my ears flick to the tune of doors slamming and two separate voices shouting obscenities. 

I’m up on my hind legs in a sprinter’s dash when I hear it. A gruff, solemn voice turned quiet, timid even, “You—? You . . . saved . . . me . . . ?”

Continuing with my apparent trend of poor decisions, I turn my head to look him right in the eye, and by the way his widen just the smallest bit further I realize the moon must be reflecting in my eyes with that yellow-green predatory shine. I must be a scene. All eight feet of me. All monster. A scene that, in all honesty, will probably replay in his nightmares for years. I already feel bad about that.

The words come from low in my chest, deeper than a growl. I don’t want the sound to frighten him more, but maybe the words will alleviate his fears. _“I would never hurt you.”_

I’m gone faster than his gaze can follow.


	2. One in the Hand

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The return home means leveling in a very adult way with a very teenage daughter and being real—but not too real—about what needs to happen next.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Oh my god, you guys, I might actually cry. I put out one chapter and in less than a day there's such an outpouring of love and support, I don't think my tiny heart can handle it! I love you guys so much!
> 
> Click [here](http://crescentmoondemon.tumblr.com/post/165566760598#notes) for John’s canon appearance.
> 
> Link to the [Terminology Master Post](http://crescentmoondemon.tumblr.com/post/165422480878#notes).

A teenager might be reasonably upset to be disturbed in the wee hours of morning on a school night. Especially so if by a parent rummaging noisily through the bathroom at four in the morning, so when Amanda staggers in with a stormy half-frown of _what-the-actual-F-is-the-meaning-of-this?_ on her face, hair disheveled and sleep clothes warm and adequately rumpled, I can’t say I blame her.

Yet as guilty as I feel for the sobered up look of shock that splinters her face at the sight of me, I can’t stave off a tiny pinch of pride when her immediate reflex is to rush to me—nearly barreling me over and forcing me to take a seat on the toilet lid lest we both fall to the floor—and assess the damage. My hand is bound up in what was once a favorite shirt of mine, gray drenched red with drying blood, and free hand fumbling with our first aid kit. 

“Oh my god, dad, what happened!?” she exclaims, all traces of sleep gone in a flash.

She isn’t quiet about it, and her raised voice in the tiny bathroom is mayhem in my ears. Nor is she particularly gentle when she takes my arm, thoroughly inspects what skin is left uncovered, probably for evidence of silver burns.

“Sorry to wake you, honey. Just lost my footing, is all. Scraped myself on a rock while I was out.” I force a smile that feels genuine enough but choke on a whimper all the same.

If the amount of blood that’s seeped through my makeshift bandage is anything to do by, she’s justified in not believing me. Still, despite the concern pulsing in those tired eyes—puffy now from panic and barely withheld tears—she puts on a brave, dubious smile and my heart sinks with regret for lying.

There’s so much patience in her when she talks; she reminds me of her father. “Come on, dad, you don’t need to act tough for me, I’m not a kid anymore. And you _never_ just fall while you’re out on a run. You’re too tough for that.”

It’s more patience than I feel like I deserve. 

I look down, resign myself to the tutting and unfathomable levels of worry that come next as Amanda begins to unravel the very ruined cloth. “Robert, he . . . he had a knife, and—”

Her eyes blow wide, hands stilling on the wrap. She gasps, _“Mr. Small did this?”_

“No, no, not on purpose,” I quickly say, hoping to reassure her while simultaneously jumping to the defense of my friend. “He was scared and drunk and probably thought I was trying to hurt his dog and—and he was in the road and there was a truck coming. I pulled him out of the way, but in the confusion I lost sight of how I was holding on to him, and next thing I knew we were both safe but his knife was through my hand. It wasn’t intentional, sweetie.”

Amanda nods vaguely, my explanation apparently satisfactory, yet the suspicion of a teenager worrying over their only parent lingers. The shirt comes off. We cringe in unison. A tentative scrub with hand soap under a lukewarm tap reveals the long, angry red line running vertically down the middle of my palm, accompanied on the back by a similarly positioned gash about a third the length. Without fur to obscure things, I guess it does look pretty bad.

“Youch,” Amanda sympathizes.

“Yeah.”

She gives the heel of my palm a careful squeeze, and while it gets a whine from her dear old dad, less blood than expected comes from it. With the worst of the mess cleared away, she and I can both see the smooth, pink edges of new skin already forming.

“Anything feel like it’s broken?” she asks me.

I shake my head. “Just sore. Man, this better not mess with my put-put game or I’m _really_ gonna be mad.”

Amanda gives me a look, but I’m her father. Even in the face of Hollywood-esque levels of blood splatter, the tiniest smatterings of humor help alleviate some of her worries.

“You and your pup-put game,” she smiles, shakes her head.

She retrieves betadine from under the cupboard, some clean gauze, and a fresh ace bandage from the first aid kit and cleans both sides of the wound. All of this I can do myself, would probably prefer to, but I know my kid, and if she needs to be the responsible one before going back to bed then I can do my part until she decides she’s had enough. It isn’t the first time I’ve come home from a run bleeding, and, yes, it’s never been due to clumsiness despite the white lies Alex and I cooked up to spare her the worry as a child, but it is the first time in a long time. What was once a routine we graciously allowed to fall out of practice now comes back to us, fresh in our muscle memory, and more sour than ever.

She swabs the betadine front and back until the skin is a sickly yellow hue, slathers on copious amounts of Neosporin, sandwiches me between two pads of sterile gauze, and wraps it all up tight with the ace strip. None of us ever had medical training, but doesn’t matter. It’ll heal by morning.

I test the binding with a tentative squeeze and immediately wince. 

“I hope the other guy looked just as bad,” Amanda says to me, a cheeky half-smirk with knuckles perched on her hips.

I grin up at her. “Oh, yeah, you shoulda’ seen him. It was close. The ref finally had to call it after ten rounds; he was afraid we were going to kill each other! I had him on the ropes, though. You’d have been so proud. No truck can best wolf-dad!”

Amanda giggles, shoulders bobbing as she tries to stifle herself with a hand. “Well, wolf-dad is lucky he heals fast and the knife wasn’t made of silver. Also he didn’t, y’know, wind up as some buzzard’s Sunday brunch. Scholarships are nice and all, but my tuition isn’t going to pay itself.”

My jaw drops and I clasp my good hand over my heart in an over-the-top pantomime of getting punched in the gut. “ _Ooh,_ that’s a low blow, kiddo. I’m offended you would have so little faith in me! I have the reflexes of a hawk!”

She rolls her eyes good-naturedly, but the look she gives has more than a small pang of truth to it. An accidental knife to the hand is no silver bullet, but we both have reason to worry. This is no small scrape, and I was still _seen_. 

By Robert. Robert-freaking-Small. 

No, things aren’t as bad as they could be. Robert is no Hunter, but he has a sharper eye than he lets on and wits like a razor blade. He’s smart, observant, and way too paranoid. Also hotter than Hades, but that’s a different can of worms. 

Things could be worse. That doesn’t make them _good_.

“Truce?” I genially request, arms open with a smile that pleads for forgiveness.

My daughter smiles right back at me and falls into my arms, squeezing me tight—since when was she able to reach all the way around my shoulders?—and wary only of the arm that doesn’t squish her back as hard.

“I’m so sorry, hun. I didn’t mean to scare you like this.”

“I know you didn’t, dad. Just—try to be more careful next time, yeah? Keep your eye on the ball. But also the knife. And _especially_ the truck.”

I’m so proud as we separate.

“Can do, kiddo.”

“Was Mr. Small okay?”

I nod. “Pretty sure. When I left, he was more in shock than injured. Barely scraped. I don’t think he even got a sprained wrist out of it. Hopefully he’ll get a ride home and wake up thinking it was all a bad dream.”

She nods back, eyes narrowing the tiniest amount as her brows pull together in the middle. “Did he . . . see you?”

“While I was big, yeah, but I didn’t go human at any point. He doesn’t know it was me.”

“Alright. Let’s keep it that way, okay? And maybe don’t let him see that hand for a few weeks, too.”

I arch an eyebrow. “Why not? Far as anyone knows, I got this during an unfortunate and purely coincidental yard care mishap. Unruly hedge trimmer, you see. I’ll even cut my hedge trimming short tomorrow to make it more believable to potential witnesses.”

Amanda shakes her head at me, clearly not about to let it stand. “Not gonna work, Pops. Tomorrow you won’t have a wound, you’ll have a _scar_. One you definitely didn’t have yesterday. Dude’s paranoid as all get-out, and a movie buff to boot. People in movies get their deepest, darkest secrets revealed over less _all the time_. You want to remove any possible suspicion? Keep away from him for a couple weeks until the scar has a chance to fade. Better yet, wear gloves. It’s still cool out, so it won’t look too weird, even on you. Just _don’t_ let him see your hand.”

Never has a father been more proud to have sown the seeds of such a fine young detective as I. My daughter—Amanda “Sherlock Holmes” Maverick. I might cry just imagining that scrawled neatly across the page of a diploma. Crime fighter, detective, and photographer extraordinaire. 

“You really think a cut would tip him off that easy?” I ask, already suspicious as to the answer she’ll give me.

In a kind world, the average, everyday human would need a bigger basis of suspicion than a line on the palm to reach the conclusion of ‘my neighbor is a supernatural being.’ But Amanda and I both know the world is not a kind place to people like us—to someone like _me_. And Robert doesn’t require much.

She looks upon me dubiously. “He saw you get stabbed, right?”

“It was his knife, and he saw me yank it out, yes.”

“And he’s seen enough movies to know that a _varúlfur_ could also look like—” She motions at me towards the last, letting her words fall and her hands hang like it’s a big reveal. I sigh; she has a point. “Or at least suspect it. And you’ll conveniently have a scar in the same place the creature he saw was injured. A scar that wasn’t there before his encounter.”

I grimace. Why does media always have to complicate everything? Curse Hollywood and their trashy, horror-drenched, over-the-top, and utterly, grossly, morbidly enjoyable depictions of werewolves in modern cinema.

“Alright, panda, I get it. No more dates with the ruggedly handsome for this dad.” I sigh dramatically, hang my head, and sink defeatedly into the toilet reservoir. 

“Oh, I didn’t say that. I said don’t let him see your hand. As for the rest of you.” She gives me a morbid, noncommittal sort of gesture. “That’s up to him.”

I can’t help quirking an eyebrow at her. “Are you giving me permission to be reckless? My sweet, darling, innocent, never-done-a-questionable-or-uncouth-thing-in-her-entire-life daughter?”

She grimaces. “Please, don’t say ‘uncouth’ ever again.”

“Ugh, yeah. Makes me feel old just thinking it.” I rub the back of my neck, pleased to find the sting in my hand considerably diminished compared to when I got home. “Thanks for the patch job, sweet pea. Guess I still need it.”

Amanda smiles back to me, hugs me tight. “Anytime, wolf-dad.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> _varúlfur_ \- "werewolf" in Icelandic; the term werewolves most often use to refer to themselves as plain "werewolf" or "dogman" are viewed as offensive (unless Google Translate has failed me which is also possible)


	3. Seven Lords A-Waiting

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Telling a lie enough times can make you start to believe it—until something comes along and reminds you.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I should point out now that all interactions occur with the assumption that all dates have been completed to the second date with the best endings for all. If it seems like they're being repeated here, it's honestly not intentional, I just couldn't come up with anything better. XD
> 
> Click [here](http://crescentmoondemon.tumblr.com/post/165566760598#notes) for John’s canon appearance.
> 
> Link to the [Terminology Master Post](http://crescentmoondemon.tumblr.com/post/165422480878#notes).

“Dude, bro, what happened there?” 

I fumble with my weights, a bead of sweat slipping past my saturated eyebrows and slithering into the corner of my eye like the wet, salty jab of a demonic finger. Wincing, I put the bar down and frantically blot my face on my sleeve, breathing harder than any self-respecting father would care to admit.

“Huh?”

“Your hand, bro. That’s a pretty gnarly scar.” Craig nods at it, and I give the offending limb a self-conscious flex before swiftly grabbing up my water bottle.

“Oh, uh, unfortunate hedge-trimming accident. Coulda’ happened to anyone, it’s not a big deal,” I say between labored huffs, more grateful for the brief lapse in exercise than I’ll ever let on.

“Yikes, man, that had to hurt. Didn’t need stitches, did it?” Craig grimaces, mind probably filling with an assortment of softball related injury scenes.

I shake my head. “Nah. Looked worse than it really was. I heal quick, y’know?”

Craig nods. A far-away look drifts into his expression, and I’m struck by not only the way sweat makes his skin shine but the realization he must be remembering something from a long time ago. For the life of me, I can’t think of what it might be.

“Yeah,” he finally says, “you always have. Up for another rep?”

I fight back my cringe with a determined smirk. “Always, bro.”

Craig grins, broad and toothy and not the least bit phased by my apparent fatigue. He takes me to the bench press, piles it with an alarming amount of excess weight, and it’s while Craig is spotting me I start to think that maybe this isn’t so bad. Sure, there’s a point where I can’t get the dang thing off my chest, but a guy could get used to the view.

* * *

“That’s new,” Mat says beside me while I remove a formerly red now mauve _Duran, Duran_ album from the stack it was tucked inside.

“This? No way, this album came out in the ‘80s!”

“No, man, you’re hand. Is that new?”

Mat points.

The tips of my ears flare a few degrees hotter, and I tuck my hand in against my side along with the album without thinking. “Nah, happened a while ago. My hedge trimmer tried to rebel on me, happens to the best of us.”

He looks at my arm. Even where it’s tucked, he can still see the smaller mark on the back of it: a pale pink line against darker skin. Tender as a saint, his fingers wind delicately around my forearm and extricate it from my side. I don’t resist, too transfixed by the way his hand fits around mine, smooth but calloused in a way—and places—that suggest small, repetitive motions, like those received from guitar strings, piano keys, and espresso machines.

I can do little of anything but _stare_ as he turns my hand, eyes intent behind the dark rim of his glasses, and traces the pink line in my palm with his thumb. It ends with a slight hook towards the heel, and he follows that with a slow sweep that sends a shiver down my back.

He notices, drops my hand, and takes an awkward step back.

“Sorry, sorry,” he apologizes, smiling sheepishly with a blush that rivals my own. “It doesn’t still hurt, does it? If I made you uncomfortable, I—”

“No, no, i-it’s fine. Really.” Man, when did it get so hot in here? “Thanks for the concern, Mat, but I’m fine.”

Mat nods. “You still up for coffee later?”

I smile. “Heck yeah, my dude.” 

* * *

“Good to see your put-put game hasn’t suffered any,” Brian says, taunting smile partially obscured beneath his thick orange fuzz. Dang, why can’t I grow a scruff like that?

Realization of what he must mean makes me double take and misfire, sending the golf ball hurdling in the opposite direction of the hole. My internal scream is less internal than I would have liked, but luckily Amanda and Daisy have opted to enjoy each other’s company in the laser tag arena next door rather than those of their dear old dads, so it goes unreprimanded. Good thing, too, because something tells me Amanda might never let me live down how close I come to losing my dadly cool.

“Pardon?” I smile through tightly clenched teeth. “My game has never suffered a day in my life.”

“Buddy, I can tell, believe me. You’re doin’ great given what happened to your hand.”

I double take, but at this point I’ve dealt with the questions enough times that the impulse to hide my arm is easily overlooked.

“My hand’s fine. The hedges fought valiantly, but they will never betray me again.”

Brian’s laugh booms through the course, every part of his thick frame rocking with the hearty sound. He steps up to replace me at the entrance to the hole and claps me on the shoulder before I have time to edge out of his way. His hold is strong but not rough. Firm, secure, and he gives me a friendly shake that has me fighting back a sound somewhere between a squeak and a growl. Which sound is more dominant is a question even I can’t answer, but it’s subtle enough Brian doesn’t notice.

“Worthy foes, I’m sure. If you ever need help beating them back into submission, just let me know. My _Hedge Master 9000_ would make quick work of those suckers, I wager.”

The competitive streak in me peaks at the word, and before Amanda’s legendary spidey senses can tingle, the wager has already been set.

* * *

It takes Damien’s wandering gaze to fall short and linger a little too long before I even realize I’m fiddling with the gargoyle’s ear. The air is cool but the sun warms the stone nicely, and I don’t really know why but the texture of sun-warmed marble just sounds so appealing to me right now. Smooth and warm with the barest hint of coolness from the breeze that ruffles the garden, green leaves and an ocean of vibrant petals dancing in the early spring bloom. A subtle peek at the marble grain reveals a few small cracks hidden amidst their own shadows, and I realize with an inward smile that this is the same gargoyle I so carelessly broke and seamlessly put back together on my first visit to this beautiful place.

 _Hey there, old pal. Sorry about last time. Promise I’ll be gentle on you from now on,_ I say to the statue in my mind, imagining the gargoyle nodding in a way that would in no way cause its head to fall off.

Damien looks contemplatively at the gargoyle’s ear, too, and I slowly withdraw my hand.

“Forgive me, I did not mean to unsettle you with my gaze,” he says, concern palpable in how he looks at me, garnet eyes shining in the late afternoon sun.

“Nah, it’s all good. Guess if I were in the Victorian era, I might need to wear gloves or something, huh. Weren’t scars seen as kind of unseemly?” That sounds right, right? Like something that would be a thing. Ladies can’t show their ankles, so dudes with scars must be something similar, right?

I half expect Damien to nod, but he doesn’t. Merely observes me in meditative silence, the breeze stealing wisps of his long, dark hair and fluttering it in his eyes. How is that not getting in his eyes, I wonder vaguely, because the last time I let my hair grow out more than an inch I couldn’t _stop it_ from stabbing me straight in the retina.

“Perhaps,” he says after a long period of quiet. His hand finds its way to the spot mine once occupied, fiddling gingerly with the ear whose texture delighted my fingertips, and some part of me wonders if that spot might be just a tiny bit warmer than the rest of the statue. “But I do not believe it would be appropriate to do so.”

“How come?” I ask, one eyebrow raised. 

“I have fine silk gloves if you want them; they would suit you nicely, I believe. But the world would be lesser for it. Some customs I am less fond of than others, you see, and to deprive the world of skin as fine as yours would be a travesty unto itself.”

I blush. Really blush. Like, wow, is it hot out here or is that just him?

“Um, th-thank you, Damien,” I stammer, fighting back the urge to turn away and merely avert my eyes. Like that would somehow spare me the embarrassment.

He smiles, full of charm and elegance. “It is only the truth.”

* * *

“You didn’t . . . get that from one of my kids, did you?” Joseph asks, staring unblinkingly at the smudge of chocolate on my hand. Only looking at it for myself do I realize the stain is in such contrast to my skin tone it practically makes the scar pop up with a megaphone and scream _look at me!_

“Huh—oh! No, no, no worries, Joseph, trust me.” I wave my other hand as if to swat his concerns from the air. “Got this from yardwork, not any of your precious little dev—er, angels.”

He catches my slip, and his face breaks out in a look of unabashed amusement, probably relieved to know his children were in fact not the cause of bodily harm to one of his friends this time. 

“No, no, you might be right to call them that. Good Lord knows I think it sometimes, too,” he admits, leaning in close to whisper it to me. “Just don’t let any of them hear me say it.”

His concerns over the kids possibly overhearing him are completely justified, I think, because even though Chris is upstairs with Mary and Christie and Christian are running around somewhere in the backyard, tiny Crish stands in his playpen in the living room staring directly at us, gray eyes blank yet piercing. Unblinking. Not the barest hint of childlike wonder, only _knowing_.

I glance away from the tiny human, suddenly uncomfortable for reasons I can’t explain, feeling bare and on display before the inscrutable comprehension of a soul far beyond itself in age, and when Joseph clears his throat Crish flops back from the soft mesh barrier dividing us and returns to his plush whale shark.

The distraction is a welcome one, and once the cupcakes have been poured and the pans slid neatly into the oven, Joseph takes my hand and wipes the remaining chocolate smudge with a damp rag. His movements are slow, deliberate. Thorough, I think, until the lingering brush of his fingers dawdle for just a second too long on my open palm. He lets go and steps back, pink rising in his cheeks the same color as strawberry ice cream.

“The cupcakes will take a while to bake,” Joseph says, not looking directly at me until he does, and his grin is nervous. “Are you thirsty? I think I still have some Margarita mix laying around.”

“Parched,” I say with a timid smile.

* * *

God, I love cheese. Which cheese? _All the cheese._

If Hugo’s smile is anything to go by, so does he. Or maybe it’s the trivia. Trivia night, as it turns out, is a tradition so longstanding that not even grading midterms can weaken its allure. He needs the outing, I realize. So do I.

He takes the trivia seriously. Normally, I would too, especially with Brian and Mat on the competing team, but there’s something about tonight that just takes it right out of me. Not in a bad way. I’m not tired. _Leisurely_ feels like a better word for it. It’s nice, feeling like I _can_ and _should_ take it easy.

Hugo takes a piece of brie and swabs it in a generous helping of jam, expression absolutely blissed by the sweet and savory contrast of tastes. I go the less exotic route and nab a triangle of sharp cheddar, and I catch the instant he sees it. I hesitate to pull my hand back despite the gravitational pull of my taste buds.

Hugo looks at my hand, to me, my hand again, back to me. He straightens but says nothing, and I take my cheese and a heaping helping of garnish. Man, that hits the spot.

“I know it’s none of my business,” Hugo begins, and by this time I’ve been asked so many times I’m over it, “but if you need a physical therapist, I can make a recommendation.”

I blink once, twice, then twelve more times and remember to finish chewing and swallow before attempting speech. 

“Oh. Um. Thank you, Hugo, I appreciate that.” Wow, I really do. “It’s, ah, not actually as bad as it looks, though. It doesn’t interfere with anything, and it doesn’t hurt anymore.”

He nods, knitting his fingers together in a bridge below his chin, and offers a smile that makes his caterpillar of a moustache quirk up at the corners. Man, that’s _cute_.

“If you decide you need it, you can always call me.”

* * *

I should have been keeping an eye on it, I realize too late. Should have been more conscious of my movements. But with three shots of whiskey in my stomach I’m not thinking as clearly as I should be. It hasn’t been cool enough these past couple weeks for gloves, and when I wave to Neil for another round I find my wrist snatched from midair by the rough vice of a callous hand. I jump with a startled and highly undignified yelp, tugging reflexively back, but Robert’s grip doesn’t budge.

His eyes are intense; they’re always intense, but this is something different. Something _more_. They’re dark, in the irises and the skin beneath his eyelids like he hasn’t slept in days—maybe he hasn’t—but they’re also bright and alert despite the haze he must be feeling. He unwinds my fingers from their tight, claw-like curls where fingernails are digging into my palm. His fingers are rough yet oddly delicate with me, and he stares hard at what he finds.

My heart thunders in my throat.

This isn’t my first time back to Jim and Kim’s since what happened at the overlook, but it is the first time I’ve had the nerve to intentionally meet him. When I walked in, he was already at the bar with this far off look about him, and I knew that night must still be heavy on his mind. How could it not be? It is in mine, and my part wasn’t nearly so stressful. Not in the same ways. I can’t imagine what it must have been like to come nose-to-snout with _me_.

But here we are, face-to-face, and the look in his eyes as he stares into my open palm is anything but stressful. It’s subdued.

He meets my gaze, and I see it. A _notion_ so intense it borders on knowing.

My guts tighten remorselessly, and I pray the alcohol hasn’t inhibited my ability to hold in facial tells.

“What happened?” Robert asks quietly. That rough voice as gravelly and solemn as his appearance, and when I try to extricate my hand he doesn’t put up any resistance.

“Nothing serious. Lost a fight with my hedge trimmer,” I say with an embarrassed smile, so well-rehearsed at this point it comes out almost naturally.

“Doesn’t look like a hedger gash.”

I reel for a second and think I may actually be swaying in my seat, as if the words have hit me with all the force of a speeding pickup truck, but I grip the edge of the counter and center myself for a retort. “Yeah? Well, what _does_ it look like?”

I regret asking as soon as it’s out, wishing I could bite those words out of the air and swallow them like the tainted morsels they are.

Robert knocks back the tail end of his whiskey, looks at me from the corner of his eye. “Don’t see many hedger cuts, but I see plenty of _knife_ wounds.”

Please don’t let me be shaking. Please don’t let me be shaking.

“It’s from a hedge trimmer, Robert. I appreciate your concern, but it’s not a big deal.”

“How?”

“What?”

“How did you hurt yourself with a hedger? Weren’t you wearing gloves?”

“I—yeah.”

He faces me in his barstool. Like this is somehow more interesting than a yard care mishap. Like it’s so much more because it _is_ more, and I can’t let him know that I know.

“Where were your hands when you got cut?” he asks, one brow raised.

“H-huh?”

“Where. Were. Your. Hands?” Less patient, now.

I lean back, following some archaic instinct I haven’t had since facing down the angry façade of my father, snarling with teeth bared over some stupid accident as a kid, duck my chin to cover my throat, lay back ears that are still small and plush with puppy fur, and avert my eyes.

“O-on the—on the handles.”

“Not near the blades?” His dark eyes are steadily narrowing.

“Well, I—not when I got cut. Had to push the hedge up. Wasn’t paying attention.”

He leans in, and the feeling of pursuit drops a smoldering stone into my belly. It’s palpable, the impulse to drop belly-up on the floor with my tail between my legs. Bare my throat in the face of the fangs that will either tear it out or hold me down until nothing, _nothing_ will make me want to get back up.

His voice his low, tone edged with cinders. “Then how did you get _stabbed_?”

“I didn’t.”

“It went _through_. Through your palm.”

“It _didn’t_ ,” I repeat with considerably less patience. “On the back, that’s—that’s from something else.”

“From what, John?”

I squint my eyes shut, shake my head, and when I open them again I’m just a guy. Just a guy, no tail tucking, no throat baring, and no urge to bare my teeth at the challenge in those dark eyes. No want to put strong teeth to his neck and pin him with the solid weight of muscle and fur.

“Robert, why does it _matter_?” I ask, more heat to that word than a calm man might deem necessary. Because I’m not a calm man. This is the opposite of calm.

That seems to get him. Robert leans back, out of the personal space bubble he was invading, and sits ramrod straight. Tense and horribly uncomfortable in a way that deflates me like the _Hindenburg_. Like he’s been caught somewhere even his vast storytelling repertoire cannot untangle him.

He says nothing. Doesn’t look at me. Just hails Neil for another shot, knocks it back, and waits for the burn to settle and pass.

“It doesn’t,” he finally settles on. “I just. . . .”

My belly flips. “Just what?”

Robert is quiet for a time, and I think he may not respond. He fiddles absently at his shot glass, staring into the remnants of a small, gold pool at the very bottom. When he speaks, I have to lean in to hear him. “You remember that spot I showed you with the view of the city? Where we heard that . . . guy dumping trash illegally?” 

I nod slowly, thinking back on an eerie howl even I couldn’t place and a misshapen figure skulking beyond the trees, letting that memory be the cause of my heart to race and not the alternative. “Yeah?”

“Few weeks back, I went up there to think. Clear my head. Had a bit to drink, so maybe some of it was in my head, but . . . I thought I saw. . . .” He trails off, shifting in his seat as if squirming under the weight of eyes on him.

I crack a nervous smile. “You saw the Dover Ghost?”

He grins at that, the corners of his eyes puckering in a way that settles my stomach.

“Damn, y’know, I think I actually _did_ this time?” he admits.

I blink, quirk an eyebrow. “Wait, really? Are you messing with me? I can’t tell right now.” 

Robert shakes his head, raising one arm to run his fingers backward through his hair, tugging absently through the strands. “I don’t know anymore. Humor is a construct and I don’t have a permit to build.”

I snerk.

Too fast to second-guess myself, I ask, “What did it look like?”

He shrugs. “Big. Black, I think, or maybe dark gray. And . . . furry? I think it had a tail. Hell, I had a bit to drink while I was up there; I could be wrong.” He looks over at me, catches me staring, and asks, “What?”

“Now I _know_ you’re messing with me.” 

Robert smirks at me. “What makes you so sure?”

“I mean, c’mon, you trained me better than that. Fur? A tail? Sounds like you’re describing a cougar. And I don’t mean Mary.”

Dramatic coughing fails to conceal his snicker. “It was on _two feet_ , John. It stood that way. Walked. Ran. It _grabbed_ me. It had hands, and I felt ‘em, but it stood on two paws. And it _wasn’t_ any bear. Thing was _bigger_.”

I’m really smiling, now. “It touched you, huh? Good touch? Bad touch? Do I need to be the adult here?” 

He laughs more fully, the tension I felt between us falling away with the rocking of his shoulders. “Oh, definitely. I could show you where on one of those cute little sack toy dolls, but I’d rather just show you myself.” My face goes hot with a blush, uninhibited thanks to the alcohol; he giggles. Neil refills our glasses with little prompting. Robert knocks his back without hesitation, but I can’t work up to stomach to take mine just yet, so I watch Robert wince as the liquor goes down, exhale sharply, and wistfully say, “’S good. I wish you could’ve seen it, John. Eyes like burning amber. Eight feet tall and fuckin’ _incredible_.”

My blush is easy to explain by that point, and I try not to let his compliment get to me. Really try. Like, do my damndest to let it roll off and be gone for good, but it races twenty-eight dizzying loops around my head in the two or so seconds it takes me to respond.

“Sounds like it was one hell of a night.”

“Tell me about it,” he chuffs. “Sorry I got weird about your hand. It reminded me of that is all. I think . . . when it grabbed me, I hurt it? Had my whittling knife out and I guess I sort of just reacted.” 

I shrug my shoulders, painfully aware of the details he hasn’t shared. The truck. The save. The witnesses. The _words_. “You protected yourself. Good thing, too, by the sound of it. Who knows what it could have done to you.”

He nods slowly, looking into his glass of water in a way that shows just how badly he wants to say more; if I didn’t know more, I might have missed it, but I do. He wants to, but he must be thinking better of it. Because a creature encounter is one thing. _Contact_ is another.

Taking my shot glass, I turn to face him and hold it up. He quirks a thick black eyebrow at me but catches on easily enough, looks pleased, and raises his glass of water in my direction.

“To cryptids,” I toast. “May they remain forever elusive. Because the world is so damn full of mysteries; what’s a few more?”

Robert laughs heartfully. “Cheers to that!”


	4. Headlong

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> All roads lead to Rome.  
> All paths lead back to where we started, but staying the course means never turning back.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Legit freaking crying over how wonderful and supportive you all are! Omg I love you guys so much! Thank you so so sooooo much for checking me out, kudo-ing, and commenting! It really helps me out! **smooches all**
> 
> Click [here](http://crescentmoondemon.tumblr.com/post/165566760598#notes) for John’s canon appearance.
> 
> Link to the [Terminology Master Post](http://crescentmoondemon.tumblr.com/post/165422480878#notes).

It only takes a few days this time. The itch is back. Back and stronger than ever. Craig’s workouts help during the day, but the restlessness of the night makes my legs bounce and burn. More than once I’ve woken to the _thunk_ of my head on the wall after changing in my sleep, claws burrowed in the sheets. It’s never a good sign.

My thoughts won’t stop. They’re racing. At any moment I’m afraid they might outrun me.

The way his eyes shined when he said it. _Fuckin’ incredible._

I can’t get it out of my head; I need to get out.

I need to _run_.

Amanda helps me cook up something this time, and we’ve come to the ever reliable hangover excuse. Why was I drinking all day? Not important, but I’ll be out of commission for the rest of the night, please leave your message at the groan. _Uggghh. . . ._

I stretch before I leave, so the jog to the park is more tease than warmup. Just enough to get electricity skittering through my veins. There is next to no moon tonight, but the sky is clear and the stars provide more than enough light. The forest near the overlook is out of the question, at least until I can determine whether Robert is still going back there. The woods that border the park are connected to the forest reserve surrounding Maple Bay; it makes for the perfect starting point.

I check my surroundings routinely as I go. No cars in parking lots, no sign of fellow late-night joggers, no bar-hopping stragglers or young hooligans out to make trouble. On a full moon when the light is better, maybe, but not tonight. Tonight, it’s dark. It’s quiet.

It’s mine.

One more check over my shoulder confirms it’s clear. I sidestep and jog casually into the dark away from paved sidewalks and lamp lined streets, walking until the bushes thicken and grow wild, where branches hang lower and the stashes of spray paint end. Deeper until the road sounds fade into nothingness and no streetlights exist anywhere in the world. I find a spot, quiet and secluded, and open my senses to catch on the finer details. Crickets, leaves rustling in the breeze, bats, the chatter of a raccoon that is less sneaky than it thinks.

It’s perfect.

I lunge through the transformation. In the span of a second, bones crackle as they break, lengthening to the tune of roiling, bulging muscles twisting into new shapes not suited for human skin, black and gray fur rolling up through the flesh and down to envelop every inch of it, nails growing and hardening, blackening into claws, nasal bridge snapping as it stretches. Blunt white teeth elongate into sabers bigger than a human finger, ears prick and perk into tall triangles, feet that stretch and twist into massive paws, and my tail flicks out of my lower back in a billowy swish of fur.

I tear off into the night. The din of crickets shudders and falls mute as I streak past them, hammering through a full gallop, savoring the way their songs stutter in fear only to restart once I am little more than memory. Night birds scatter from their roosts, bats squeak and dart away, the raccoon chitters in a panic and dashes for cover beneath a decaying log. An owl abandons its prey mid-dive in time to avoid the snap of my jaws when I leap for it. No malice, no hunger, yet I chase it all the same.

I have to chase. This is how it goes. A dance as ancient as nature. I am predator, and everything, _everything_ is my prey.

They startle. They flee. I _chase_.

The owl flies over obstacles I have to skirt around and vault over, ricocheting off the trunks of trees and bounding seamlessly over fallen logs and scattered boulders. The chase is mostly futile. I’m not hungry; I will likely never catch it. But what if I can? What if I _do_? The owl is soon beyond me, its wings too silent over the pounding of my heart. But I don’t need to see it to track it. All I need is a fresh trail.

My nostrils flare, soaking in the scents of the forest. Wet earth, broken leaves, slight garbage, greenwood, deadwood, some dog’s piss a few days old, an opossum that drops dead as I race by on pounding feet. Underneath it all, like the faintest streak of color on the lowest corner of the world’s most intricate painting, I smell the owl. Feather oil, pine resin, vole blood—

Leather and cigarettes. 

The scent flashes through my brain alongside arms folded over a red shirt or gesturing with his sunglasses, leather creaking where it pulls just a little at the shoulders, laughing helplessly with a glass of whiskey in his hand.

_Fuckin’ incredible._

I slam to a halt, claws dragging gouges in the soft, loamy soil. Breath slams through my lungs, flooding my nostrils with the scent. He’s here. The trail is fresh, maybe an hour old. I wait for my breathing to soften, my heart to slow, then continue quietly through the low brush.

It doesn’t take long to find where the trail begins: a clearing roughly quarter the size of a football field cut haphazardly into existence by stubborn youths in need of seclusion, maintained solely by the steady wear of near nightly visitation. There’s a dirt trail just wide enough for a vehicle to fit down with no wiggle room, and by an instinctual sense of directionality I know it leads down a backroad which leads south to Maple Bay and northeast toward Cadysboro. Somehow, despite the precarious nature of the makeshift road, Robert has managed to fit his truck here and parked it at the edge of the tree line. No surprise there.

I stand at the edge of the woods poised in the dark beyond all line of sight, one paw gripped for balance on the lower branch of a birch tree. A single solar light illuminates the clearing and its lone vehicular inhabitant; it provides all the light I need to know Robert is nowhere to be seen.

The scent is fresh, less than an hour old. I can’t pick up any signs of Betsy, either. _Good,_ I think. Cryptid hunting isn’t the safest place for an adorable little boston terrier. 

I deadpan when it hits me that _I_ might just be the cryptid he’s out here for.

I grumble audibly and stand there debating if I should resign myself to making sure this numbskull of a man doesn’t get lost in the freaking woods or if I should just pack up and go the heck home. The last time I was fool enough. I got _lucky_. Lucky once does not guarantee lucky twice. But still I tilt my head, cock my ears left and right, and wonder how his scent can smell fresh but still be more than an hour old. Did he overlap or—

_Snap._

“Don’t move.”

Every nerve fires in agonizing unison when I go rigid. My hackles raise at the metallic _slink_ of a pocketknife flipping out of its handle. Claws dig furrows into the branch, the smell of injured greenwood momentarily masking the smell of smoke and leather. Not from in front or lingering on the ground, but from _behind_.

Leather, smoke, sweat, and earth, but not whiskey. He’s not drunk, and something about that worries me more than if he were.

My head turns first, followed slowly by the rest of me. One small step, then another, and we’re facing each other. Or, rather, he’s facing _me_. I stare him down—way down. Robert stands barely out of arms reach, no higher than the middle of my chest, and closer than any sane human ever should be. That fact must hit him all at once because he staggers a few steps further back. Probably realizing just how dumb and dangerous of a situation he’s just put himself in.

Good.

But Robert doesn’t run, and the knife doesn’t go away. Rats.

He’s staring me down, yet the vehemence in his eyes does little to hide his fear. He stinks of it. The sour tang of fright comes on the heels of gazing up the maw of something bigger, stronger, faster, and deadlier than you in every way. I’ve smelled it more than a dozen times in my life, and, well, it doesn’t do his natural scent justice.

I really wish he would quit looking me in the eyes like this.

“You’re the . . . one from before. At the overlook. You spoke before,” Robert says haltingly.

His brows knit in the middle when the silence stretches on without reply.

I lower my arm from the tree branch, claws sticky with sap, and nonchalantly lick them clean. The taste is awful, but the stickiness on my fur is more annoying. It’s clear Robert has no clue what he’s doing, and I am so beyond caring at this point. If he were going to be reckless, he would have done it while my back was turned, or at least come armed with more than a dang pocketknife. 

“So, speak. I know you can.”

I pause grooming long enough to stare at him. Is he . . . ? Surely, he’s not serious. Well, damn, that sure isn’t happening. (Yikes, language, John. What would Amanda think of me?) I resume grooming, dragging my tongue over my paw pads until the sap residue is gone, keeping a close eye on him from my peripherals.

He’s being ignored. Pointedly so. And Robert knows it.

His jaw clenches.

“I know you can understand me,” he growls, taking a brave—or stupid—step forward. I stop licking. The idiot truly looks ready to fight. “You _spoke_ before, so you can speak again. C’mon!”

My eyes narrow, lip pulling up in one corner. He must not be able to see because he steps forward again, repeats his command, and this time I leave no room for miscommunication. My jaws snap with a low snarl that stops him where he stands, lips pulled back showing pink gums over incisors larger than his butter knife. No words, yet the message is clear: _come no closer._

The snarl fades as the space between us lengthens again.

“What . . . _are_ you?”

Like I really need to answer that. Come on, Robert, you’re too smart for these formalities.

The makeshift parking lot and its surrounding trees are illuminated by the single lamp light: solar powered, put there by petition alone and maintained by the stubborn few who frequent this lonely place and are too proud of their own handicraft to leave a single light unchanged. It stands somewhere behind me, lighting him up in unflattering yellow. I sidestep it, step again, further until he mirrors my every move. Back step, back step, good, keep following. Robert never gets any closer, but he refuses to let me gain distance. Maybe it’s not a smart move, but I admire his tenacity. We never break the curtain of trees, always keeping to the shelter they provide.

I watch him for the moment the light hits just right, and there it is. His eyes blow wide. The knife falls from his hand completely without noticing, and that’s when he must really see me. Where it all sinks in—what he’s seeing. That he wasn’t too drunk, wasn’t high on the adrenaline of nearly getting hit by a truck, that the truckers weren’t bullshitting him. 

This is real. It’s all real.

_I’m_ real.

I smirk, a pleased sort of rumble thrumming its way up my chest and out of curled lips. I fold my arms across my chest, and that seems to confound him even more. The posture, the gesture. Because that’s something a _person_ does, not _me_.

“What are you?” he softly repeats. Less consternation, more unbridled awe. 

My ears snap to attention. Behind us, up the dirt road comes the clattering drone of a struggling engine, booming bass, shouting voices that teeter just past the lip of puberty. 

Oh, no.

I call it on my own party and make a break for the deep woods.

“Oh, no you don’t,” Robert snaps.

He grabs me.

_Of all the **stupid** —!_

I whirl in a flash of clawed instinct, thunderstruck by his audacity. The force of his body hitting the tree dislodges a rainstorm of leaves, and I bare my gums into the face of a man I’ve never found easy to read, but right now I read him clearly, for he is petrified. Small, knife-less hands scrabble uselessly at the hand—paw?—that holds his throat. I let him struggle, shifting us both until the oncoming headlights glance by nothing but empty trees.

He stills, only for a second, than fights me harder, struggling to breathe against my grip. “Let me go—! _Ack, h—help_ — _mph_ —!”

I tighten my grip until breathing is the only thing he can concern himself with. I cover his mouth with my other paw. It’s huge compared to him, nearly covers his face.

_“Be quiet,”_ I growl through my teeth. _“I won’t hurt you, but if you scream, I **will** silence you.”_

I flex my hand on his neck just to emphasize. The points of claws prickle the nape of his neck.

Eyes bug, Robert gawks. Nods once, shallow, shaking. Behind him, the headlights flick off and car doors swing open. Voices come across the clearing. I hear the voice of Lucien, Damien’s son, and something about a hotbox. Disgruntled yammering about a truck and nowhere being sacred anymore.

Getting a gauge on their movements, the kids aren’t going anywhere soon. I let go of Robert’s mouth.

He hesitates where he stands. With the pressure on his neck gone, he slumps against the place he was once pinned, but I don’t wait for him. I don’t run or look back, but a moment later the trot of heavy footfalls catch up with me. I don’t look at him. I never said he could come, but I conveniently forget to tell him to leave.


	5. We Stood Beside the River

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Along every road there are holes and ruts, stops that must be made, and crossroads to contemplate. Every path less traveled has a reason why.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> When you want to churn out chapters like a bro but gotta do things in moderation like a responsible adult. #overeagerwriterproblems
> 
> Special thanks to skainyar for a hilarious comment that shall be forever immortalized in dialogue!
> 
> Click [here](http://crescentmoondemon.tumblr.com/post/165566760598#notes) for John’s canon appearance.
> 
> Link to the [Terminology Master Post](http://crescentmoondemon.tumblr.com/post/165422480878#notes).

The stream is maybe half a mile from the clearing. We don’t need to go far; I’m confident teenagers won’t come into the woods when there’s an empty lot to loiter in, and I’d hear them long before they got close anyway. Robert sits on a flat rock barely big enough to fit him and whittles absently by the light of a small campfire made from twigs and various bits of scattered deadwood. An unlit cigarette hangs between his lips, yet to be needed.

He says nothing, yet even with his hands working and attention occupied I feel him looking at me. Back turned, I crouch at the water’s edge away from the heat and glare of the fire. The warmth is unnecessary and the light a nuisance. The sound of the water provides a welcome distraction from the Amazon River of thoughts ruthlessly cascading through my brain.

We have to move again. Simple as that. We left our old place after a peaceful twenty years and Amanda just settled in; she got to keep her old school and all her friends, but all that’s bupkis, now. We have to leave Maple Bay. Leave the county, probably the state, maybe the country.

I’ve never screwed up this badly before. Why am I doing this to myself? I got lucky with Alex, but _this_? Have I gone mad? Has the stress of my daughter growing up finally broken me? Do I _want_ to wind up as a museum taxidermy? Or the centerpiece in some private collection somewhere, posed all cute-like with a turkey in my mouth?

I moan, pulling my paw down my face. The rake of claws through the velvet on the bridge of my snout provides at least some distraction. Then the flick of a flint sparker snaps my ears around, and a moment later my faux calm is intruded by the musky-sweet smell of cigarette smoke.

Robert speaks first.

“So, what are you?”

Whatever you do, don’t get snarky, I tell myself.

_“The Ghost of Christmas’ Past.”_

Shit.

Robert huffs, and the sound is slanted by an audible grin.

I want to kick myself. What was my old man’s number one rule? Don’t engage. Never engage. Someone sees you, you run. You run and you never look back.

I look at him over the mound of my shoulder. Our eyes meet. Robert goes still, like an eight-point buck lit up by blaring horn and headlights; the cherry of his cigarette swells between his fingers and lips, face lit with the red-orange glow of the snapping fire.

I smirk. _“You don’t know where I can find Ebenezer Scrooge, do you?”_

“How do you know you’re not lookin’ at him?”

I pivot and drop to one knee in the soft soil. _“Is that a confession? I should warn you, I’m wearing a wire. This is all being filmed for the first installment of_ Long Haul Paranormal Ice Road Ghost Truckers: Spooky Woods Edition. _It’ll be a hit. I’m this season’s host.”_

Robert is truly smiling, now. He sets his knife and partially-whittled stick aside , takes the cigarette between his fingers, and exhales a thin line of smoke from the corner of his mouth. The breeze carries it downwind and away, sparing my senses this time.

“You’re full o’ shit,” he decides, gruff yet somehow satisfied.

_“And here I thought I was being convincing.”_

He gives me this look that speaks for itself: _not a chance._

“Well, if you won’t tell me what you are,” stretches his legs out in front of him and on either side of the fire, “do you have a name?”

I feel my face skew up with twitching lips and narrowed eyes. No reply, I return my attention back to the water and glare daggers into the cute little frog now staring up at me from the opposite bank. Just a frog, brown speckles on a shiny, fleshy green back. His beady black eyes glint in the firelight, puffs his jowls at me with a sound like the tiniest foghorn that could, and hops into the stream with a dainty splash. Gone forever in a _this is your problem, you deal with it, I’m out, peace_ sort of way.

_“I am Moonripper of Clan Blood Horizon,”_ I growl. _“My pack is strong. There are hundreds of us. Tonight, we will feast upon your flesh and carve your bones into beads for our pelts.”_

I chance a glance in his direction. He’s staring at me, motionless, cherry smoldering between slightly parted lips.

I smirk, full of teeth.

_“Just kidding. It’s Fluffy McSparklepants III.”_

Robert coughs. The cigarette falls, and he quickly flicks it off before it burns a hole in his tattered jeans, crushes it under his boot heel, and coughs until the fit turns into a barely contained riot of laughter.

“Shit, well, you can have my name if you won’t tell me yours. I’m Robert.”

_I know._

It’s at the tip of my tongue; I nearly say it. I know who you are. We met at Jim and Kim’s. We drink there often, sometimes Mary joins us. We bar hop. We talk; though, not much. Mostly, we bullshit. You hate idle chitchat. You took me to that overlook, showed me how to whittle, got the hell scared out of us by something even I couldn’t identify, and you opened up to me on the drive home. I count that night among some of the best nights in my life, do you know that?

We live in the same cul-de-sac. You’re my neighbor, and you never kiss and tell.

“Robert Small,” he finishes. The way he says it, I half expect him to reach out for a handshake, but he doesn’t, and I’m thankful for it. “Anything I can call you if you ain’t got a name? Just don’t tell me it has the word ‘moon’ in it or I might crack.”

I chew on my teeth for a moment, giving myself time to consider. _“For the strong, silent-type, you ask a lot of difficult questions.”_

“Difficult? Or unanswerable?”

Christ, why does he have to be so smart? And an ass? Smart ass. Smartass. Hell!

I hesitate. _“Yes.”_

Robert says nothing, hands hanging limp between his knees. I scratch my hand down my muzzle again, snap my maw in annoyance with a low, sharp grumble in my chest, and shove to my feet and pace a curt line up and down the bank. He watches me, adds another stick to the fire, and I squint through gritted teeth as the light flares briefly and dies back down.

I pace. He watches. Black and gray fur glints auburn in the light; I hardly notice, but he must.

When it becomes clear neither of us is going to speak again, Robert returns to whittling.

I wheel on him. _“That. That right there.”_

Robert stops, looks up at me, and cocks a wordless eyebrow.

_“You’re just—do you even care? Do you **know**?”_ There are barely words for this, let alone sentences. _“Do you have any idea the kind of situation this puts us in? You knowing? Me **letting** you know?”_

He shrugs, flipping his stick over to inspect its unrefined shape, and peels off a thin strip of pale wood. Everything smells like smoke, wet soil, greenwood, and leather. “If you were gonna kill me, you’d have done it by now.”

My hackles stand on end, lips curling more fully. Oh no you don’t. You don’t get to fucking dismiss this.

I take a step forward. _“I still can, you know.”_

“Then what’s stoppin’ you?”

_You._

It comes so close to my tongue it nearly slips. My jaw snaps shut, teeth bare, and ears pin back angrily. I turn with a snarl and pace a longer, faster line up the bank, hind claws gouging the soft earth with each backward kick. Everything about this situation makes me want to _scream_. And he’s so _cool_ about it! Twice now he’s stared down the jaws of a creature that would send most to the psych ward, yet where fear once resided now only a calm reticence remains. And it’s driving me _crazy_.

Is he even still scared of me? God, he better freakin’ be, or that means he really is insane and that makes me _more_ insane for leaving this in his hands.

I stalk to Robert’s side and drop to a crouch, getting right up in his space. Were the situation any lighter, I might find the sudden shock that splits across his features laughable. How he leans back so far he nearly slips off his makeshift throne, eyes bugged, staring back into the green-gold refractions of light prey animals rarely live to tell about. He gapes, mouth open, fumbling for words, something, anything, and there it is. The sour tang of apprehension invades his scent.

Satisfied, I roll back onto my heels and let gravity lead me into a sit, elbows on my knees with paws closer to the fire. They’ve grown cold from standing in the damp soil. It feels good to warm them.

I watch the fire as he gradually settles. His heartbeat lessens from the frantic, rapid thump to something more reasonable, and Robert resumes his previous position and lights another cigarette.

_“What are you making?”_ I ask.

He holds it up like that’s supposed to answer my question.

_“I can’t tell what it is.”_

“Not supposed to. ‘S not done, yet.”

I sigh. Heavier than is rightfully necessary. Robert looks at me, but he says nothing. The silence digs in like a gopher, unreachable in its depths and winding breadth, but it’s far from empty. The fire crackles, crickets chirp, bats titter, an owl—possibly the same owl—calls distantly. The stream burbles a gentle tune, a frog croaks somewhere at its bank, answered by another further off, and above it all Robert’s knife scrapes idly at the wood in his hands, peeling away thin shavings and small chunks. For the life of me, I still can’t determine what he’s making. Maybe it’s an abstract piece. More than likely whittling will just never be my forte. 

I tilt my head back, breathe deep, let the smells flood into me. It’s such a nice night. Much as I love the run, I love this, too. The quiet, the calm. Robert’s right. There’s no need to fill the silence with empty chatter. Just let it be. There’s warmth in it, comfort. Even without the fire, I might still call it that. Warm.

Despite everything, I still enjoy sitting with him like this. No matter what skin I wear.

The fire begins to die again, but Robert lets it go down slow, returning the knife and half-sculpture to their respective pockets once there is no longer enough light to see by. I stand up and take a few steps, ears trained in the direction of the clearing.

_“The kids are gone,”_ I observe.

“Thank Christ, my ass is killing me,” Robert groans, pushing himself up with some noticeable difficulty, namely in the knees and lower back. I almost go to help him, think better of it, and keep my paws planted where they are.

Robert flicks his cigarette butts into the coals and puts it out with dirt, and he follows my lead back to the clearing. The lighting is poor, but with some tips about tree stumps and roots he manages not to trip on anything. The lamplight is still on when we arrive, and it lights up a grassy lot devoid of all semblance of civilization save for Robert’s truck. I stop at the edge of the tree line, but he continues on ahead and circles his vehicle with a critical gaze, peering into the cab, into the bed, hops one leg on a wheel and rifles through some stuff bundled in a blue tarp.

Robert comes back looking only moderately annoyed. “Punks took some of my beers.”

I hum noncommittally, don’t know what to say, and just look at the car path and think with any luck the kids will get pulled over, Lucien will have the right hell scared out of him by a good-natured cop, and be driven back to the cul-de-sac where his dad will read him the Victorian Era riot act. With any luck.

Robert runs his hand through his hair, ending it with a rough tug at the back of his head and a firm, gravelly sigh. Hard enough to grimace and apparently pull himself out of whatever thoughts were going through his head.

“So, am I, uh, ever gonna see you again?” he asks awkwardly, pointedly not looking me in the eye this time.

I smirk. And this time it’s not even against my better judgement. That’s just, wow, a cute thing to ask. 

I shift my weight from one paw to the other, tail flicking once. _“If all goes according to plan? No. Never. I’m already late for poker night with Champ and The Jersey Devil, no way in hell am I missing croquet with Bigfoot.”_

Robert’s grin splits from ear to ear and folds his arms over his chest. “Croquet, huh?”

_“Hey, don’t knock it. Old Sassy’s got the kind of swing mini golf just can’t satisfy.”_

“Any chance there’s room for one more in that soirée?”

I rumble, _“I dunno, it’s pretty exclusive these days, but I think I might be able to pull some strings. Put a good word in. Tall, dark, and hairy—you’d fit right in.”_ His shoulders loosen, but I raise my paw, a single claw pointed outward at him. _“ **If.** If I have your vow of secrecy. I’m not even going to **begin** to explain how many levels of screwed I am if you spill the beans. Me doing this, letting you go, I’m putting my life in your hands. You understand that, right? No fooling. This isn’t a small thing. This is my life we’re talking about—my existence—and it’s in your hands.”_

Robert nods. No hesitation. Maybe a little grin at the play on his name, but he lets it go this time.

He extends his hand to me. “I get it.”

I smile.

Without thinking, my fingers wrap around his hand, dwarfing it utterly. Claws the size and shape of meat hooks delicately graze the back of his wrist. His entire hand fits neatly in my palm, and there’s a flash of tension in his face and the way he holds on. How we both squeeze, one of us more mindful of their strength than the other. I loosen, but Robert doesn’t immediately let go. Like he’s lost in it. Palm flat within mine, his brow creases while, unseen, scars are mingling. Miniscule is a man who has never felt so small in his entire life.

* * *

“I trust you, dad. You know that, right?” Amanda tells me, so sincere and full of patience it physically hurts.

Head in my hands, claws graze my scalp while I moan an unintelligible response. I don’t know where the nausea is even coming from anymore. The impulse buy of a near mountain of junk food or the intense sensation that _you are so freaking screwed right now, like the single most screwed person on the face of the planet kind of screwed._

And not just me. My daughter, too.

_“I’m a failure as a father,”_ I mutter, but god these fries are so _good_.

She rolls her eyes at me, the first hint of exasperation that’s leaked through all morning. “No, you’re not. You’re an incredible dad—if a bit on the hairy side. I know this is a big deal to you, but you’re going to be okay.”

Bless her. My darling gem of a girl. She knows when to encourage me. Also when to knock me off the 10:15 Crazy Train to You’reAnIdiotVille. Amanda snags two fries from the middle of the pile, feeds them into her mouth in swift nibbles, and stirs her cocoa in small, clinking circles.

_“How am I not?”_ I ask the grease stain on my napkin with ears laid flat on top of my head, a half-eaten burger looking pitifully up at me. Fast food at home feels so nice when your carefully constructed world is crumbling down around you and you just need to be yourself in front of someone you love. _“What’s the only rule? ‘No one finds out.’ No one. **Especially** ruggedly handsome neighbors.”_

Amanda snorts, finishes chewing, and folds her arms over the counter across from me. “So what? You were seen four times at the old house and we never had to leave because of it. That’s the cool thing about cryptids today, no one takes it seriously! No one ever suspects the old fashion werewolf scenario. Seriously, look up ‘dogman encounters’ on WeTube; there are some pretty rad horror narrators on there. All the stories paint werewolves like big scary animals. There’s no human element to them. No one expects the daytime façade anymore, so you’re totally in the clear.”

My hackles tense just slightly at the terms. Much as I don’t want her to notice, she does, because no matter how many times I hear _werewolf_ or _dogman_ I always get that same twinge of repulsion in the pit of my stomach. Her regret for using them is clear only after they come out. Sad lips pout around sagging, oily french fries.

“Sorry,” Amanda mutters, eyes turned down.

I brush it off with the shake of my head. _“We never needed to move because no one who saw me **knew** me. There was never a common denominator between me,”_ I gesture at myself, all bulk and fur and a 5XL pair of neon green basketball shorts, _“and the disguise. He’s seen both. He’s seen **this**.”_ I nearly shove my palm in her face.

Amanda looks at the stripe dividing the middle of my hand. Against the thick, black pad, the scar is a grayish-white line, perfectly symmetrical but for the slight hook towards the heel at the end; only the exit wound from the tip of the knife is invisible beneath my fur. Amanda wrinkles her nose at it, remembering her own point—made the night I came home with a blood-soaked shirt wrapped around my arm—about a man too paranoid to let it go unnoticed and too smart not to consider the possibility.

_A scar that wasn’t there before._

“I wouldn’t really call it a ‘common denominator,’” Amanda defends, propping her knuckles on either hip. “More a weird coincidence. Besides, Mr. Small bought your whole hedger accident shtick. The whole cul-de-sac did—hook, like, and sinker. It’s gospel, now. You can relax.”

I shake my head. _“It’s easy to say, kiddo. Sure, I can. In theory. Doesn’t mean I don’t still feel like everything’s going straight to Hell.”_

She quirks an eyebrow at me, and I realize my error. My charming daughter points wordlessly to a repurposed pickle jar at the edge of the kitchen counter. On it is a list of words and prices written in bold permanent marker by my own treacherous hand.

> _d@mn 5¢ || h3ll 5¢ || d!ck 5¢_  
>  _sh!t 10¢ || b!tch 10¢ || a$$ 10¢ || p#ta 10¢_  
>  _f#ck 25¢ || c#nt 25¢ || tw@t 25¢_

At the bottom is a half-inch layer of spare change and a couple single bills. I frown and throw in a couple quarters to cover the past twelve hours. Amanda appears somehow pleased by that.

I run my hand down my muzzle, scratching my claws through velvet. It hurts but doesn’t break the skin; I hope it’ll wake me up from this nightmare while simultaneously knowing it never will.

A small hand reaches out, touches mine, and pushes it gingerly down.

“Dad, come on. You’re hurting me just watching you do that,” she tells me softly.

I collect myself, let my breath out, and snag a cluster of fries to shove into my maw. 

“How long has it been since Mr. Small first saw you, anyway?” Amanda asks. “A month? Month-and-a-half?”

_“Five weeks, four days,”_ I mutter between bites.

“Wow, okay.” She might be impressed by my time keeping if it didn’t worry her so much. “Dad, you gotta breathe, okay? Everything’s going to be alright. I mean, it sounds like things went reasonably okay. Could have gone way worse, at least.”

_“He asked for my **name** , panda. He asked if he could see me again. This is **bad**.”_

Apparently there’s something about that, though. Something funny or cute or amusing because the corners of her lips begin to curl towards her ears, and Amanda shows her teeth in a sinister grin.

“Which part?” she impishly inquires, leaning closer across the table. “The wanting to know more about you or the part where he totally, basically asked a varúlfur on a date?”

Her eyebrow is raised when she says it in a look that is the furthest thing from worried I’ve seen a teenager while their parent is in crisis mode. If I’m being completely honest, it helps. A lot. My daughter is and always will be my biggest concern, but she _isn’t_ concerned, and somehow that helps.

I’m the parent. I’m supposed to be the one with a roadmap for every twist and turn in life. I’m supposed to know what I’m doing, to never get things wrong. To never mess up. Yet here comes my darling, beautiful baby girl with her very own GPS.

“One thing, though,” she states.

_“What is it, honey?”_

“Please, for the love of all that is good and holy, tell me you told him your name was Admiral Fluff-N-Puff.”

I snort unceremoniously.

“Or StarFang, Son of Sköll, Who Feasts on the Waning Sun?”

She looks so hopeful; I can’t help it by then. I grin so hard the edges of my mouth quickly begin to ache. _“Nothing quite so glamorous, I’m afraid.”_

Amanda makes this face. A pout so utterly outrageous it borders on genuinely offended. She slaps her hands dramatically on the table with a stinging _slap_ , facing me head-on. “Not Fluffy McSparklepants!”

I throw my head back with a bark of laughter. _“The Mighty and Ever-Living!”_

She grumbles while stuffing another handful of fries into her mouth, but not for an instant does the grin ever truly leave her. Mumbling between bites, “Yu got-uh work’n yur originaluh-ee.”

_“And if you keep eating like that people are going to think you were raised by wolves.”_

Amanda stops chewing long enough to beam concentrated starlight at me. “Good!”

I smile, shake my head. What have I wrought unto this world? _“Enough on_ Daddy Drama Corner _for today, yeah? I give, you win. You’re right. I need a break from this. How are things at school?”_

Amanda has the courtesy to swallow her fried potato mush before answering, eyebrow quirked dubiously. “You really want to replace your worries with high school drama? A la the teenage girl?”

I shrug. _“I’m already angsty. Might as well feel young again while I’m at it.”_

Amanda snorts. She tells me about her week beginning with a long tirade about the audacity of someone to sit with her group at the lunch table, and I’ll admit most of the names have little to no meaning for me, no faces attached, but the context clues keep me knowing just enough to follow along. Turns out high school today is still rife with the same drama as when I was a youth: who cheated on who or what test, who did or did not get away with scholastic or social manslaughter, and why it is so completely outrageous that Marcus H. would sit with her and Emma R. at the lunch table after “what he pulled last week in Mr. Vega’s class.”

Okay, that name drop helps fill in a hair more on the context clues, but I’m still more or less lost.

_“Did Hugo at least confiscate it?”_ I ask, genuinely mystified by these Shyamalan-esque twists and turns.

“Oh, of course he did. No way was Mr. Vega letting him go home with a wild snapping turtle in his backpack,” Amanda says, gesturing animatedly with her hands. “I mean, that would be almost as dumb as inviting an _actual_ cryptid out for drinks.”

I cock my head, confused momentarily, then ask, _“Are you talking about—?”_

“Yes, I’m talking about Mr. Small. I’ll have you know, I find his sheer amount of guts quite admirable.”

I snort, and before I know it it’s turning from huffs to chuckles to fitful giggles to full-on shoulder-quaking laughter. _“So says the varúlfur’s daughter about a man who literally went cryptid hunting armed with only a pocketknife to defend himself!”_

Amanda’s eyes light up and she exclaims, “ _Right?_ What a legend!” We laugh; my burger is long gone and the mountain of french fries has been reduced to a modest hill. “But, seriously, Captain Herman Faulkner-Steinbeck-Dickson-Lovecraft the Fourth is forever immortalized in sharpie at the bottom right corner of the white-board. Turns out Lucien is actually crazy good at miniature drawings. It’ll be weeks before Mr. Vega even notices.”

Yay for happy endings!

She smiles at me, her eyes soft with a kind of contentment I think is seldom seen on many high schoolers these days.

“Can I be real with you for a sec, dad?” Amanda asks, all soft smiles and heart-melting adoration.

_“Always, Manda Panda.”_

When she reaches across the table, I meet her halfway, and she squeezes my big, furry paw. Tight but also gentle. Grasping onto me like the very first time a tiny, soft hand squeezed a giant black claw. She looks different now, so grown, but in some ways still the same. No longer gurgling and wiggly, sure, but she still smiles beamingly into a face I was once so positive would only make her cry.

“You’re going to be fine. I’m going to be fine. We’re _both_ going to be fine,” she tells me. Confident and firm and self-assured in a way I would have envied fifteen years ago. Now, it makes my fur puff out with pride. Because this is _my_ daughter, and she is absolutely not about to make me cry. “Mr. Small might be one of the prickliest cactuses out there, but he’s not the type who spills deep-dark secrets over drinks and gross pizza. You made it clear that talking about you puts you in danger, and I think we can both agree that the last thing he wants is for the only cryptid in town to spontaneously disappear. That’s more than enough to keep him quiet.

“Plus, if you really think about it, he’s more of a cryptid _looker_ than the actual hunter-type, y’know? Like the kind of guy who becomes a Park Ranger for the solitude but stays for the squirrels; he likes looking for and occasionally finding things, but overall he’s against poaching. You get me?”

I chuckle. Not because it’s funny; although, it kind of is. But because it’s true. Because I agree. And that helps so much more.

_“I get you, sweet pea.”_


	6. But Twas the Night who Washed Us Clean

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Over a hill and through the woods where no one is meant to enter, where promises are made and tentative agreements found. Those with the most to lose wonder: are promises made to last, or are words just words?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Because I'm a freaking sucker for humans/non-humans interacting. Just, ugh, shoot me nooooow! I freaking love writing John as the wolf and him and Robert interacting!
> 
> Fun fact: this chapter almost never existed! Originally I was going to have the big reveal at the end of the last chapter, but it felt like things were being rushed so I tacked in some filler and it spilled into more chapters of character and relationship building goodness!
> 
> Click [here](http://crescentmoondemon.tumblr.com/post/165566760598#notes) for John’s canon appearance.
> 
> Link to the [Terminology Master Post](http://crescentmoondemon.tumblr.com/post/165422480878#notes).

_Park ranger, not poacher._ I cling to that thought as the days pass in greater numbers. It calms me, gives me hope. Enough that I spend less time combing through real-estate articles and more time contemplating my Dadbook contacts. Yet even in the welcome respite of my daughter’s encouragement, the anxiety lingers.

Hopes can still be dashed. They don’t change the reality of the choices I’ve made.

The overlook was a mistake.

The bar was a mistake.

The clearing was a _massive_ mistake.

Why do I keep doing this to myself? I’m smarter than this. I know better.

 _Stay out of the woods,_ I keep thinking. Day in, day out. Keep out, keep away. He’ll be looking for me, so let him. Just never let him find me.

 _Stay out,_ I tell myself. _Stay in._

But I have to run.

* * *

Blood pounds in my ears as my paws beat a merciless cadence over the ground, kicking up the leaf litter behind me in a stream. I bear my teeth into the wind like I mean to devour it, ears lain back as a snarl tears the air in my chest to ribbons.

Run. Run faster. Keep running.

Don’t stop.

Frigid night air bites at my eyes and nose, burning my exposed gums and setting a fire of needles in my lungs. Trees streak by in shadowed blurs. The moon is nearly full, but clouds steal the light of the stars. I need neither to see, but the swaths of white light bathe the forest floor in diamond hues. It’s beautiful. It’s eerie. It’s. . . .

_Fuckin’ incredible._

He smiles when he says it, eyes alight like he can see the thing standing before him, half crouched or with its back turned towards the stream. Eyes full of awe because he’s really seeing this. No dreams, no whiskey. It’s there and it’s real. And it’s. . . .

I clack my teeth in a rageless fury, refusing to let the words echo in me again. Yet they still linger, whispering at the back of my mind. _I wish you could’ve seen it._ Twice now he’s smiled at me like that. Once at the human façade, our bellies warm under the lamplight as we stumble home from a movie we snuck into like giddy teenagers. The other time with—

_Eyes like burning amber._

I blast down the trail, ignoring the caterwaul of a startled bobcat, bray of scattering deer, wild bunnies fleeing ahead of a sluggish raccoon, and the indignant screech of an owl as it fades somewhere behind me. Other creatures disperse from my path like water at the prow of a ship, creatures humans do not have names for. Things that hide in the dark amid moss, tree roots, leaves, and the deep shadows beneath rotten logs. Things with fur like tree bark and scales like blades of grass, feathers like needles and wings half falcon and half moth; eyes that bulge all-seeing and pearlescent in a thousand unnamable colors. Things that Robert would kill to see and kick himself to know just how close he’s been all this time.

A scent flares ahead of me, so unexpected I nearly stagger in my stride. A black bear? Here? I’ve never heard of bears in this region of the state, let alone this close to town. It must have wandered here from further south—in search of new territory maybe? I snort. It has another thing coming.

The faux heat in my belly swells into genuine flame. I bare my fangs and divert my path to follow the scent, forcing my legs to beat faster than my heart. I will not stand for this trespasser. Not the danger it represents. The world narrows as tunnel vision takes hold, tuning out everything beyond it. The smell is fresh; it’s not far. Nothing else matters. This is no longer a run.

This is a hunt.

I hear little over the howling wind, but in the dark a racing blur soon takes shape ahead of me. The scent is strong: musk, urine, a rotten tooth, hunger. I skirt wide around the trail, gauging trajectory and size, and when our paths cross it never has a chance. Its prey darts ahead with the bear on its heels, little more than a dark, whimpering shape. The bear is nearly upon it.

Then we collide.

Our bodies _crack_ when we hit. Head down, shoulders braced. Rib bones pop like the crackle of dry leaves. All the momentum of a runaway train, the force lances a roar of fury out of me. The bear yowls as it tumbles, flailing, but I’m on it before it can recover. A maw with teeth bigger than its claws clamps onto its snout. Swipes are exchanged, snaps and bites and bestial wails. How it wrenches and twists against clawed hands gouging into its face.

Everything that happens is by merit of instinct. Nothing personal. I’m a father; I keep my daughter safe. If it has cubs, it will do the same.

The tumble is brief. Barely more than a few seconds. Savage roars and yowls rend the quiet night. Across my tongue splits a wave of hot iron and fear. At its first chance, the bear kicks my belly with its back legs and bolts in the opposite direction it came. I chase it a few paces, snapping at its heels, but once it is clear the thing means to run until it can run no further I let it go.

Adrenaline burns my limbs, pounds in my ears. The coppery stench of blood is thick about me, and it satisfies me to no end how all of it is from the bear. Nostrils flared, hackles raised to a prickled tower, I snap my head to the tune of whimpering behind me. Ears pinned, exposed gums colored with blood, and eyes that reflect in blazing moonlight.

Only for it all to fall away like a landslide. Because he’s sitting there with eyes blown wide panting like he’ll never breathe right again, scraped and filthy and pale with a quaking terrier in his arms, shirt and jeans torn.

You can’t be _fucking_ serious.

* * *

I don’t smell human or dog blood, but I ask anyway. _“Are you hurt?”_

Robert shakes his head.

_“Betsy?”_

Here he hesitates. Betsy is crushed against his chest, her claws cratered into his jacket sleeve like fingers grasp a life preserver in a storm. She shakes as if buried in a blizzard, eyes bulging and panting her little lungs out. Robert holds her in a way that prevents her from looking directly at me, but her tail is tucked and I know she knows I’m here.

“She’s okay,” Robert says after a brief pause to look her over, like he’s trying to convince himself of the same. “She’s made of tougher stuff than that, aren’t you, girl?”

Betsy whines, yabbers nervously, and goes back to panting.

I’m unconvinced but nod anyway. The trail left by the bear can be seen in the breaks of the foliage, but Robert’s scent trail is equally prominent. Sweat, smoke, and leather all tainted by a sour cocktail of adrenaline and fear. This is fairly deep into the woods. He must have been out here for hours before meeting it. The chances for me to find them out here, it’s a miracle I even did, let alone to have near literally stumbled upon them this way. What if I hadn’t . . . ?

I shake the thought from my mind. It’s irrelevant, now. And it doesn’t take a genius to guess why he was out here in the first place. 

The trail is clear. I begin walking, trusting he’ll follow.

“Wait,” Robert calls out, less desperately winded. “Where are you going?”

He hasn’t even gotten up yet when I look back.

 _“Taking you back to where you started,”_ I say. _“Stand up.”_

Robert frowns but offers no protest aside from a twitch of the eye. With great care, he sets Betsy on her feet, but she dutifully—or perhaps frightfully—does not leave his side. Not nearly as frightened with the imminent danger chased off with its tail between its legs, my apparent disinterest in her and the distance from me to her master help calm her, but it does not change my fearsome appearance or first impression. It isn’t until Robert pushes awkwardly to his feet and lets out a mighty hiss do I realize the real reason behind his reluctance. He’s favoring one leg quite noticeably, keeping the weight off by balancing one hand on a shrub too low to properly hold onto. 

_“Wait. Sit back down. Let me see that.”_ Swish of the tail, I come back over.

Betsy tucks and cowers, and as much as it breaks my heart I can’t let that be my focus right now.

Robert fixes me with a look. Which is odd because he has to crane his neck back to do it. “I’m fine.”

 _“You’re not fine. And **not fine** out here causes a lot of problems. Just let me see so I know what I’m dealing with.”_ Then I add on a separate note, because he must be thinking it, too, _“I’m not actually going to eat you.”_

Robert doesn’t do anything at first. Just watches me while leaning what little weight he can on the shrub. He’s a stubborn man, but I’m a single father with a teenage daughter. I have patience.

The appeal of sitting is ultimately what gets him. He hobbles his way to the relatively even surface of a fallen tree, narrowly avoids crushing a wayward beetle, and sits with a heavy exhale more akin to a groan. I follow a few paces back, pointedly ignoring Betsy’s cowed glances, and when Robert pulls up his pant leg he does it in a way that is more for the benefit of his own inspection than for me. The fact he can walk at all means it’s not broken, and I still don’t smell blood, so there’s that. Robert gingerly unties and removes his boot and sock while I crouch before him.

_Youch._

It’s a pretty gnarly sprain. The ankle is already starting to swell and gain an angry shade of red that comes through extra dark thanks to his skin tone.

“It’s just a sprain. I’m fine,” Robert reasserts.

_“You’re not as fine as you’d like, and walking on it will only make it worse.”_

He glowers directly at me. The audacity of it almost makes me smile.

“What do you expect me to do then? Camp out?” he snaps.

_“I can carry you.”_

It comes out so quick I’m left reeling as much as he is. Disbelief at my own suggestion brings heat to my face and ears, and once again I’ve never been more grateful for the cover of fur and darkness.

“You’ll . . . what?” Robert is justifiably stupefied. 

I commit.

_“Walking on this will only hurt you. I’m not babysitting you until help comes at sunrise, and I’m not leaving you for bear bait after going through the trouble to save you in the first place. Make no mistake, I’m **not** happy about it, but it’s the best option.”_

Robert stares at me unblinking, face unreadable.

This is genuinely not how I wanted to spend my night. Run until my lungs burn, maybe chase down a deer or boar and actually eat it this time. Maybe sit down with another cryptid for the first time in ages and exchange news from the parallels.

Robert eventually settles on, “I can’t tell if you’re fucking with me right now.”

_“I’m not. Though, I wish I was.”_

“You are _not_ going to carry me.”

I shrug my large shoulders. When I stand again, Robert doesn’t even reach the height of my hips.

_“Then you will walk.”_

He just nods. I turn back towards the trail. It takes longer than he probably likes, but Robert makes it onto his own two feet after getting the boot back on and begins the journey behind me, Betsy tottering along close at his side. In the near total dark, I can hardly imagine how he’s able to see well enough to follow me, let alone avoid tripping on unseen obstacles, so I make a point to step heavily and walk around whatever tree roots, stones, and brush I can. My strides are twice the length of his, and walking slow enough for him to keep up is a hassle, but I don’t speak and neither does he. At least, I don’t expect him to.

“Thank you,” Robert murmurs under his breath.

I almost don’t think I’ve truly heard him for a second, so unexpected is the break in silence I nearly mistake it for the sound of my own thoughts. Pausing mid-stride, I face him halfway while he catches up at his own pace.

 _“For what?”_ I ask, looking down at a man I’m so used to coming eye-to-eye with.

“What else? For saving my ass,” he states. His head tilts just slightly backward to see me better, eyes squinted in the dark, baring the hard edge of a jaw lined with stubble and the raised ridges of tendon and thick, rope-like arterial veins; it’s a strong neck, but not too big for a fanged maw. His brows furrow in the middle when he begrudgingly adds, “Again.”

I can’t help the smirk that tries at my lips. I fold my thick arms over a far thicker chest and tilt my head the opposite way of his. _“How are you so sure it’s been me this whole time? Could be any number of my kind out here. You don’t know how many of us there are.”_

“There really that many of you?”

 _“Lots. Tons. I said I have a clan.”_ I watch him chew on that like a strip of jerky that just won’t chew. Because, damn, he really doesn’t know anything for sure. I’ve said plenty, yeah, but how do you gauge truth from lies when the face you’re looking at is the furthest thing from familiar a face can get? He’s guessed right a couple times, but how can he guarantee? 

Then again, with or without the human guise he and I have exchanged a fair bit of bullshit.

“Around here?” he clarifies. “Sure as hell ain’t many of you, or else I’d have seen more by now. I’d say you’re the only one.”

I chuff, _“You sound so sure of yourself.”_

“I am.”

Tension racks the air until silence hangs heavy between us. Piercing and frigid as icicles. He stares me down—up—and I can’t help being impressed by his bravado. Even if his scent gives away the otherwise stealthy anxiety making his heart pound. Because calling a beast on his bluff might just leave Robert screwed either way.

Going the reckless route myself, I reward his pluck with uncrossed arms. _“Then you’re lucky it is just me out here. Otherwise you’d be having a very different kind of night.”_

His shoulders go from a careful loosening to a flare of rigidity. “What kind of night?”

 _The bear-filled kind,_ I think, don’t answer, and continue walking.

The silence lasts a while longer this time, but it’s far from true silence. Crickets chitter all about us, undisturbed by my slow pace. Bats and bugs flitter by, mosquitos try for my ears before being flicked carelessly off. Leaves and sticks crackle beneath my paws. His boots crunch and trample through seldom disturbed undergrowth, dense rubber soles vibrating the earth with each lopsided stride. It isn’t long before he needs to rest. He sits where he pleases, another log this time, and I keep my ears tuned to the moonlit dark.

“I knew it’s been you from the start. I recognize you,” he says, massaging the soft tissue below his ankle.

I almost don’t bite. There’s a lot I could say, far more that I don’t want to say. But, in a morbid way, a part of me does. Because the shocked look of horror on his face might just be worth it.

 _“How can you tell?”_ I ask, not needing to look at him to know he’s staring. Let him. He can’t see me well in this.

“Your markings for one.” One ear twitches his way before swiveling back; I’ll give him credit on that one. Like most creatures, no two varúlfur have exactly the same markings, and black and gray are not a common blend. “And your voice.”

When I face him then, it’s with the instantaneous snap of my head, and he shies back so slightly it’s barely noticeable. But I do notice. The moon is in my eyes, and they shine like nightmares.

 _“What about my voice?”_ Nothing calm or patient about it.

“Sounds like this kid I know,” Robert states, calmness belying the apprehension in his shoulders. I step towards him and into the filtered canopy light. Betsy is chewing blissfully on a maple branch comically too big for her. He tells his story, “Little Jimmy Thompson. Well, that’s what we called him then. Met him in the army. We were squad mates, fought through hell with that kid. Good kid, tough but idealistic. At least until Little Jimmy stood a little too close to a live grenade. Blew his leg off at the knee. When my ears stopped ringin’, he was lyin’ there screamin’ like no kid ever screamed before.

“Corpsman didn’t have anything for him, but somehow he never lost consciousness, so Little Jimmy screamed like that all the way back to Ops—so hard and so long he just about shredded his vocal cords. Next I heard him speak was two months later at the VA Hospital back home; I was there ‘cause an enemy combatant tried to burry a knife in my chest. Gave me this.” He pulls the collar of his shirt down, showing the upper half of a jagged, pale scar across his chest. “Little Jimmy recovered, but his voice never did. He sounded kind of like you do. All deep and growly, like whispering just wasn’t a thing he’d ever be able to do again.”

My stare is lasting. It lingers in places. On his hands and their many nicks, how some are more faded than others. In his eyes, searching them for small tells he might let slip in the dark. On his chest where raised, puckered skin peeks up from his right pectoral and over the top of the left before curving sharply down to disappear beneath red fabric. On his neck where a slight reflex of muscle works a swallow down, bobs in his throat, and disappears into his chest.

Not until I speak again do I realize I’m smiling. _“Nice story. But I can whisper.”_

He smirks and releases his collar, mindful not to dislodge his beloved sunglasses. “Somehow I doubt that. Big as you are.”

I can’t resist. The space from me to him closes with four strides, and I crouch directly in front of him. In this light, his leather shines in dim, worn stripes across his shoulders and down either arm. It smells so strongly like him, I’ll never smell leather again without thinking of Robert. This close, I wonder what he sees in my eyes. If it’s the fulgent, predatory sheen of amber, or if he can see flecks of a color he might recognize on another face.

 _“Never doubt me, Robert Small,”_ I whisper, staring into dark eyes flecked with the white shine of a bright, all-seeing moon.

He doesn’t lean away.

* * *

Robert has had to stop several times, each time nearer to the one before it and in increasingly longer intervals. When he removes his boot this time, he struggles to take it off, jaw tight with pain at the final tug, and when it finally does manage to come off I know immediately he won’t be putting it back on.

_“We can rest here for a while. You need to get weight off that leg.”_

He doesn’t argue, too pained to protest as he locates a moderately tall boulder and shimmies himself up on it, legs dangling beneath him for the extra reprieve of a weightless leg. Betsy busies herself by sniffing about, scenting traces of ground squirrel here and there but never quite following them far enough to lose sight of her master. She’s a good dog.

“Why, though?” Robert inquires, vague and cryptic. He looks at me from his place, hands fidgeting and empty like he needs to be holding something. Maybe a wood block, maybe a cigarette. Maybe he lost both while running for his life.

The moon is behind the clouds, now, and there’s no light for him anywhere. I’m impressed he hasn’t gone for his phone as a source of light—I can see its outline in his jean pocket—but maybe he thinks taking it out will drive me off. He’d be right.

Facing partway away from him, I look at him with my eyes but otherwise try not to focus too intently. _“Because you’re going to wreck that ankle if you don’t.”_

“No, I mean. . . .” Robert hesitates, eyes dark and intense. “Why would you help me?”

Thankful for the dark, I turn my head quickly in another direction. It hides the cyclone of thoughts that twist at Mach speed through my chest. 

I don’t intend to answer, yet I do anyway. _“Because . . . I felt like it.”_

“So many times?”

My jaw is tight, shoulders drawn. To my right, Betsy scuffles her paws at the door of a chipmunk den. She yaps into it, frustrated at her lack of progress in the face of the rocks covering the burrow, settles for a nice sized pinecone, and trots over. She’s such a cute thing; I can’t help trying. I lower until I’m sitting on my heels and extend the back of my hand, claws hidden against my palm. She stops, ears perked, and tentatively steps closer, nose whuffling through a thousand smells. She sniffs the offered hand, snorts, and her stump of a tail begins to wiggle.

I hide my teeth as I smile and rub the top of her head; the whole thing fits in the palm of my hand.

 _Why so many times?_ I wonder, don’t say. _Because you’re my friend. Because I’d do anything for you. Because the thought of you hurt terrifies me. Because even though I shouldn’t—I have no reason to—I want to trust you. Because I asked for your silence and you shook my hand even though it scared you, and I can’t get you out of my head or your scent off my hands._

 _“Call it a phenomenal, cosmic case of wrong place at the right freaking time,”_ I explain, eyes closed.

Betsy yips, trots to her master, and Robert watches her curiously in the replenished moonlight.

“But _why_?” Robert pushes, dissatisfied.

_“Because you crossed the road to get to **me**. And I really, really hate bears.”_

Robert frowns. “That’s it?”

_“That’s it.”_

“It had nothing to do with—?” He stops himself, brows furrowed as his attention turns sharply into his lap.

My head snaps up, guts twisting with renewed anxiety. _“Nothing to do with what?”_

Now, the edge to the conversation takes on a lighter turn when Robert fidgets awkwardly, chipping at a layer of moss by his thigh with a blunt, dirty fingernail.

“I, uh,” he mutters gruffly, a shift in his scent airing towards bashful, of all things, “I thought you liked me.”

The tightness in my stomach flips into a looping congregation of butterflies. I resist the impulse but ultimately fail to withhold a graceless snort of laughter.

 _“You’re not bad,”_ I admit.

Across the distance, the corner of his mouth quirks up in a half grin. “For an ape?”

_“For a **human**.”_

We both chuckle. Betsy looks between us, ears tall and tail stub flicking dry leaves about where she sits, pinecone still dutifully cradled in her jaws. She yips her own adage to the conversation, and Robert pats the open space of rock beside him. She jumps up without further ado and plops her treasure square into his lap.

“Good girl.” Robert pats her head.

While Robert rests, I get a scent for what else is around. No small amount of squirrel traffic, a troop of raccoons earlier tonight, along with the tail end of the bear now long gone. This must be about where it caught their scent. At the chipmunk burrow, something gives me pause. I blink, glancing from it to Betsy and back multiple times. There are drag marks leading into the hole where something small slithered inside. It smells vaguely of cucumbers and feather oil.

I smirk. Betsy found a coatl hole before I even noticed it. Robert has a secret weapon, and I wonder if he even knows it. She looks at me from her master’s side, panting and proud, the sides of her mouth pulled up in a doggy grin.

 _“Think you can manage a little farther?”_ I ask him.

Robert has his ankle pulled up over his knee, rubbing at it in small circles. “Depends. How far is a little?”

I turn my nose up and sniff. _“Another mile or so.”_

Robert groans thickly, apparently having not realized how far he’d come.

I come over to him, and this time neither he nor Betsy back away. _“Let me see.”_

His brow furrows at his leg, pointedly not looking at me. “It’s fine, just sore.”

_“’Sore’ is the smallest thing that is to be making a tough guy like you complain. Now, show me.”_

The second time Robert is less keen on arguing. He pulls up the tattered cuff of his jeans and confirms my suspicions. The swelling is worse. No way that boot is going back on.

 _“You can’t walk like this,”_ I tell him pointblank.

“I can walk just fine,” he asserts, pushing the cuff roughly down and pretending I don’t notice the wince.

_“No, you can’t. You’re going to wreck your ankle.”_

“And you’re not seriously going to carry me.” Robert glowers at me. “This is how you lure me into a false sense of security. Tell me I’m not bad for a human, baby me when I’m hurt. Next thing I know I’ll be waking up tied to a spit by my belt and shoelaces while you turn me over a fire to feed some gaggle of knife-wielding puppies. I see through your plans.”

I snort. _“Oh, you certainly have. This time. You’ve foiled my plans once, Small, but I won’t be thwarted twice. Consider yourself warned.”_

Robert smirks.

On a more serious note, _“I wouldn’t have offered if I wasn’t serious.”_

Robert glances away from me. He inhales deep, and lets his breath out with a weighty, unintelligible mutter. “It can’t be dignifying for you. And I ain’t exactly light.”

I blink, cock my head. That . . . can’t seriously be why he’s refused all this time, is it? For _my_ sake?

_“It’s not, but I meant it when I offered. Plus, I can carry double my own body weight. That’s like 700lbs, so your fat ass won’t even make a dent.”_

He shoots me a look. “Hey!”

I quickly cover the end of my muzzle like that’s somehow going to hide the toothy, shit-eating smirk there. _“Oops, did I say ‘fat’? Sorry, I meant tight as a snare drum.”_

Robert throws his head back with a riot of laughter, and where he must think the dark hides it I see the rise of color on his cheeks. He puts his hands up in surrender as I smile.

“Alright, alright,” he reneges. “How are we going to do this then?”

 _“Ever piggyback anyone?”_ I ask.

His eyebrows shoot up past his hairline. Utter incredulity, and it’s golden. “Yes . . . ?”

_“Good.”_

I crouch in front of him facing away, wait, but he doesn’t move. Doesn’t even budge.

“You can’t be—” he starts before I cut him off.

_“I’m always serious, Robert.”_

I look at him over my shoulder but can’t make out his motley assortment of facial expressions. Finally, he shakes his head as if to rid himself of the last vestiges of common sense, shifts carefully onto one knee, and places his hands on my back. There’s a moment where everything just freezes. When scarred, callous hands vanish into gray-streaked ebony, dense with a thick double-coat, and soft. _Soft._ Of all the words that must come to mind when he thinks of me, that must never have been one until now. Because for these first awestruck seconds he cards splayed fingers up my spine, against the natural grain of my fur, between the hulking curves of my shoulder blades, and feels more than sees his hand evaporate into the immense plume of my mane.

Robert says it so quietly there’s no way he meant it to be aloud. “Holy shit. . . .”

I don’t mean to, but I shiver anyway.

The novelty has not worn off, but Robert figures out where his hands go and climbs onto my back without further reverence. His arms lock as low as they’ll reach around my neck, and with some shifting and hiking on my part a position is found that works for us both. His legs squeeze my sides while I loop my arms under and around to cup the backs of his knees, denim shielding his skin from any careless grazes on the part of my claws.

His weight is not insignificant. It presses into my back, and through the give of my fur I feel every shift and flex. The tension in his arms where he grips on tight, firm and a bit restricting; I shift him higher so he can loosen, but that only causes him to hold on harder before he catches on and shows my neck some mercy.

Robert isn’t a light man, no, but I’m struck by the thought of how he’s heavy in the _right_ places.

 _What does that even mean?_ I think and shake it out of my head.

“This better not be a ploy to eat me,” Robert mumbles, closer to these ears than he may realize.

 _“It isn’t **not** a ploy for anything,”_ I tell him innocently.

He deadpans. “That’s it, I changed my mind. Let me down.”

Robert starts to wiggle, but I tighten my hold, snag his boot, and begin walking.

_“Nope, too late, no take-backs. You’re mine, now. Every morsel of you.”_

He growls, huffs because no matter how valiantly he struggles he can’t gain so much as an inch of leeway. Finally he surrenders with a halfhearted kick, resigns himself to just being eaten. “ _Fine,_ but I should warn you: I’m all gruff and grizzle. Nothing savory about me.”

 _“Nonsense,”_ I assure him. _“You’ve already smoked yourself halfway to a brisket, and who doesn’t love a nice rum marinade?”_

Robert groans audibly. “Are you saying my life choices have made me more appetizing? Jesus, I knew I shouldn’t have listened to that psychic’s advice.”

I laugh. _“Never trust the ones who ask for your credit card. If they’re real, they should already know it.”_

Robert positively shakes with laughter.

“How about a whiskey marinade?” he asks. “Will that deter anything?”

I think on it, debating how much truth I can wiggle in without him catching on. _“Not me. Might make that troll who lives under the bridge into town wrinkle his nose, though. That guy’s got a pallet like a pepper shaker: anyone who turns to it for good decisions clearly doesn’t know how to cook.”_

“Never heard that one before,” Robert snickers, shifting his arms. The movement sends the smell of leather into my nostrils, and my pallet is suddenly dripping wet. “Are there any other cryptids around here besides you?”

Crap. Guess you can wiggle too much truth into a lie.

I don’t answer. I could; I could show him. Probably blow his mind into orbit to know how many critters we’ve passed since the bear ran off. How many strange looks I’ve received from tiny, hidden eyes and the number of times the rustle Betsy has chased after wasn’t from a rat or raccoon.

“You don’t like to answer questions about that, do you. Not serious ones,” Robert says, none of it a question.

I step along the unseen path, no longer wary of fallen branches, oversized roots, or the lengths of my stride.

 _“Can you blame me?”_ I ask.

“Maybe if I understood. I’d like to, you know.”

 _“Too much at risk. I’m sure you’re smart enough to figure that much. One careless comment on social media or a curious statement to the wrong ear and my life unravels with metal and blood,”_ I explain, expression hard where I glare into the ground, no longer content with yes’s and no’s. If he’s going to know, he should at least understand. _“Believe it or not, there are people who know about my kind—about other cryptids—and those people aren’t **good** people. Can you see why you might make me nervous?”_

“I make _you_ nervous?” He says it like it’s such an impossibility. So much amazement behind it, it nearly outweighs the gravity of what came before. 

_“Extremely.”_

Nothing happens after that. The walk continues. Silence heavy as water, thick as tar. We pause only so Robert can adjust his grip when he needs to, then it’s right back to the path. Not a word spoken. Betsy darts ahead once in a while, yabbering at something or other before tottering back with a smile on her wagging tongue. She’s found more cryptids tonight than Robert has probably glimpsed in his entire life.

I don’t feel a need to rush for once. The urge to run is gone. Not even a restless twinge left in my legs. It’s leisurely. It’s nice.

“I promised I wouldn’t say anything,” comes his voice again. Husky and pleasant below my ear. “I shook on it.”

I sigh, having hoped he fell asleep. Never in all my days would I have imagined Robert Small could be this talkative. 

_“It’s not that simple.”_

“’Vow of secrecy’ was your word for it, as a matter of fact.”

I glower at a particularly brown leaf that looks extra crunchy, step on it, and am disappointed when it’s soggy body fails to crunch at all. _“It was.”_

He’s quiet. I’m quiet. The forest is not quiet.

“Look, I know you don’t owe me anything. If anything, it’s the opposite. I owe you a hell of a lot. If keeping your secret is what it takes to repay you, then I’m willing to let my life stand as collateral.”

I stop short, nearly stumble, and instinctively turn my head to look at him, but my head is too big and he’s too close. All I glimpse is the tip of a nose when I say, _“Are . . . are you serious?”_

Robert leans back as much as his hold allows, letting me see at least one side of his face.

“Yeah. I am.”

_“No fooling?”_

“No fooling. Wouldn’t say it if I didn’t mean it. If me keeping you secret equates to saving your life, then that’s how I can repay you. You’ve saved my sorry hide twice now. That’s not something I can just say thanks for and move on. That’s something I gotta make right.”

 _“Not just my secret,”_ I say before I can think, a new intensity to my tone, my gaze. This may be the only chance I get to secure this. _“Not just varúlfur. All cryptids. Everything you hear or see or smell or even **suspect**. Not a breath of it to anyone. Not your kids, not your therapist, not God Himself or your best friend. Nothing.”_ I turn as much as I can. Until I know he can see at least some of my eye and know just how much I mean every syllable. _“We. Do. Not. Exist.”_

Robert is quiet, even his breath subdued, yet I feel his eyes on the side of my head. Bright and intense. The same as mine.

“That what it takes?” he asks me, soft and slow. 

_“Yes.”_

“Then you have my word. None of it is real.”

I nod, and the way the weight leaves my body it feels like his bodyweight has just been halved. It’s not a huge victory. Once there may have been a time when a word was a person’s oath, their life, but today words are just that: words. If I’m going to rely on that alone, I need to expect it to fail. So, I don’t say thank you. Promise that it is, he hasn’t proven he can be held by it.

The walk goes on. Insects chirp and chitter, bats still flit, frogs still croak, leaves still crunch beneath three pairs of paws, and a buzz that sounds like a cicada but is definitely not a cicada hums to my left. As I draw near, it darts out of the cluster of leaves it was hiding in and whizzes past my shoulder curiously close to Robert before darting off into the night. Betsy and I hear it—I see it in the twitch of her ears—but the faint giggle that trails after it is too high pitch for Robert to catch.

By now, Robert’s chin is resting on my shoulder, and the grip of his arms around my neck is not as tight. My hold has never faltered no matter how long the walk or rough the terrain. He’s getting complacent. Maybe even comfortable. I let my breath slowly out my nose, telling myself the fullness with which his body lays into me is not something to focus on.

“I get that you don’t like me askin’ questions,” he tells me.

 _“It’s not so much the asking as the want for answers,”_ I reply. _“I can’t tell you much and maintain my safety at the same time.”_

“Figured. Not going to expect anything straight up. I always knew there would be an element of secrecy to this.”

I nod, only scarcely curious as to what he means by “this.”

“What if. . . .” Robert starts but doesn’t finish. The resulting pause is heavy with thought, and when it ends he speaks slowly, considerately. “What if I ask something that’s not personal? Or cryptid related? Would you answer?”

Even though I know I won’t be able to see him, I turn my head anyway. Because I have a smile I kind of want him to see. _“Aw, so you don’t want to hear about my stamp collection?”_

Robert snorts. “You have a stamp collection?”

_“Sure. It’s a euphemism for the bones of every human I’ve ever eaten. I keep just one from each. I’m going to rearticulate my own skeleton like that serial killer from Bones. You know there are over 200 bones in the human body? With you, I would have been halfway there. I was thinking maybe a finger, something personal.”_

“How about my middle finger?” he dryly suggests. I snerk and break into ugly, toothed laughter. “It’s tough to tell when you’re screwing with me sometimes.”

I hum while I readjust my hold to not let him slip. _“Good. Mission accomplished.”_

“But seriously. Would you answer just one question?”

I hesitate, consider my possibilities. _“It would depend on the question. And the answer.”_

Robert nods.

_“What’s the question?”_

“I’m . . . thinking of one.”

* * *

The hills curve sharply upward at a point and force me to ascend on all fours; Robert holds on awkwardly, made to straddle a back that is not meant to be ridden on, but once we are at the summit I find us right where we need to be. The road is clear for miles in either direction, the overlook empty save for one antique red truck, and I check both ways before crossing. Betsy races ahead of us, nose to the ground as she inspects the perimeter, and I ease Robert to the ground at the back of the truck where traffic is less likely to see me.

Robert hobbles one-legged for just a second before bracing himself on the tailgate, and I place his boot beside him on the bumper.

“Thanks for the lift,” he says. The long walk has left a kink in his shoulder, and he rolls it up high with a salty grimace.

 _“Are you going to be able to drive back alright?”_ I question. It’s dark out, he’s exhausted, and his leg will be killing him for days.

Robert shrugs. “Ain’t got much of a choice. Unless you wanna drive me.”

Now there’s a thought. I snerk, and Robert grins sideways at me.

_“Oh, the look on the officer’s face when I get pulled over. Priceless.”_

“Don’t have to worry about license and registration if the cop faints,” Robert says with a chuckle.

_“True that.”_

As we laugh, Betsy sniffs out the perimeter of the truck, under and around, and in another tighter circle, marks her territory in the grass, and trots proudly over where she flops into a lopsided sit. Right in front of me. I raise one wolfish eyebrow and feel Robert watching with obvious interest. I extend the back of my hand to her. She sniffs it, tail nub mimicking the path of a stumpy windshield wiper in the dust, and lolls her tongue in a very boston terrier sort of dopey smile. She yaps noisily in a declaration of approval and wiggles like a worm when I scratch behind her ears. Turns out claws make for excellent skritches.

“She doesn’t like many people,” Robert tells me, a hint of awe in his voice. We must be quite a sight.

I hum, barely aware of my own tail swishing back and forth behind me. _“Must be my animal magnetism.”_

“When I first saw you, I thought you were going to eat her.”

_“I thought that might be the case.”_

“What were you doing, then?”

I open my mouth to answer, close it, heavily debate on the truth route, and go for broke because he’s staring at me and I’m hesitating like I have a guilty conscience. _“Trying to get a bottle of booze out of her reach. Liquor is toxic to dogs.”_

Betsy tilts her head back while yabbering ecstatically, curving her body into a black and white croissant so I can scratch her back more fully, both hind legs trying to thump the ground at the same time when a particularly good spot it found. She licks at the air, butt wiggling like a bad dance move. I can’t help but chuckle at her antics.

“So, you really weren’t gonna . . . ?”

I fix him with a cold, unamused stare. _“I don’t eat dogs.”_

“That like cannibalism or something?”

If not for the genuine pang of offense, I might have laughed. Instead, I roll my eyes ostensibly and let out an exasperated chuffle. _“Is it cannibalism if you eat a lemur?”_

“Point taken.” He pauses, looks at the ground, and even though I’m not looking at him I can smell when his mood shifts back towards timid and then rueful. “And . . . I’m sorry I stabbed you.”

Okay, now that’s pretty cute. _“I forgave you once it was healed.”_

“Uhhh . . . huh? Really?”

_“I heal fast.”_

“Hm.”

Luckily, Betsy makes it impossible to remain chagrinned at anything for long.

 _“You still haven’t asked your question.”_ Without looking at Robert, I relinquish my spell on the terrier, and she bounds off to recheck the area for interesting smells.

Robert nods absently from where he sits against the bumper, staring out at the view of the city lights strewn out below us like a reverse starry sky. “Trying to decide if it’s too personal.”

Fair enough.

I shrug noncommittally. _“Won’t know unless you try. Might surprise you.”_

Robert’s arms cross his chest. The leather creaks where it pulls at his shoulders, and my pallet is wet again for reasons I cannot explain. His neck and jaw work around the absentminded chewing of his inner lip, thick brows furrowed where they meet at the middle. It doesn’t strike me until right then how the reversal of perspective feels. How Robert sits a full head taller than me, eyes unreadable yet somehow displeased without a clear reason to be so. It’s not the first time I’ve seen him like that, but under the cast of the full moon light—so white it seems somehow blue—it is the first time wolf eyes have truly seen him. Sharp and clear in a way human eyes can’t compare.

Finally, Robert makes up his mind, unfolds his arms, and looks at me straight on without hesitation. “Can I see you again?”

My move is out of sheer reflex, snapping to my feet and stepping away as I gape at him. As if somehow the words are bullets, they sit hot and piercing in my gut, beneath and behind my heart where my being stammers from the heat of shocked awe. My jaw tenses shut. Everything about me goes still as stone.

Because realistically? Yes. Absolutely, he can. Can and will. On some levels will probably be invited to see me again. Because we’re neighbors, friends, drinking buddies. Not a week goes by we don’t meet up to hang, sometimes it’s drinks with Mary or just walks around the bay where we throw rocks into the marina; sometimes we get pizza or burgers or sneak into a movie like kids or get coffee at The Coffee Spoon, just the two of us. Because nights like that are some of the best I’ve ever had in this town, and I never want them to stop.

All of this races forty-eight dizzying loops in my brain. All while gaping at him, and Robert stands there quietly. Patiently waiting on an answer he genuinely does not expect to receive. Because he won’t push me for it. Would never dream of it. And something about that settles my roiling insides into a placid, sun-warmed lagoon.

His dark eyes are bright with the blue-white glimmer from the moon directly overhead. I turn my head partway, unable to hold the quiet intensity I see in them, and pivot my ears in the direction of Betsy digging in the dust below the passenger door.

_“Maybe.”_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> *takes you by the shoulder and gestures to the world* Cryptids. Cryptids everywhere.
> 
> Also Betsy is a beautiful wonderful creature and the perfect plot point when it comes to dispelling tension.
> 
> Seriously though you guys, I just wanna smooch every last one of you! All the love and support you've all given me really drive me to want to write more! I never expected to enjoy writing this fic as much as I have and it's all thanks to you! Cheers to you beauties!
> 
>  
> 
> ***slams some whiskey***


	7. Making Waves

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Anything can hide beneath a calm surface, but once the stone of opportunity breaches quiet waters the ripples created will not stop until they reach the end. And, sometimes, being wrong can feel so right.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Click [here](http://crescentmoondemon.tumblr.com/post/165566760598#notes) for John’s canon appearance.
> 
> Link to the [Terminology Master Post](http://crescentmoondemon.tumblr.com/post/165422480878#notes).

As much as I’ve come to appreciate the financial advantages of sneaking into movie theaters late at night, there is something keenly satisfying about paying for your own ticket fair and square. Especially in the presence of good company, an overly buttered bucket of popcorn, cooler full of cold beer, and the bright light of the moon in the bed of a pickup truck. Even if said company isn’t big on small talk, it’s probably for the best, because _Jaws_ viewed at a drive-in theater is the kind of experience best had in silence.

Well, maybe not _perfect_ silence.

“The hell are you makin’?” Robert leers over my shoulder, unlit cigarette hanging from his lips. Usually he demands quiet with his movies, especially the good ones, but evidently my screw-up is so monumental it warrants the dismissal of a few rules.

The mangled block of pinewood in my hands does not resemble much of anything. I glower doubly intense at it, having once thought my creation was coming along so nicely. Flipping it over and around, I see no semblance of its intended design. “It was supposed to be a duck. Now I’m 90% sure it’s becoming a dick.”

Robert snorts. “Nice.”

We both snicker because, hey, we’re grownups. Scattered pine shavings litter the futon mat we sit on. Robert is reclined against the back window of the truck, sans jacket, while I sit stubbornly forward to focus on my carving as well as the movie. He seems only half invested in either activity, and even then it accounts for maybe three-quarters of all the thoughts drifting in and out of his focus. There’s a lot on his mind; I knew that the moment he messaged me over Dadbook and asked if I had plans.

Even with his attention divided, Robert works his way effortlessly through the curvy body of a charming little gecko. It’s not abnormal for him. Robert usually looks contemplative in some way, but doubly so tonight. Maybe he’s focused on his carving. Maybe he’s thinking about what he had for breakfast and whether it was good or not. Maybe he’s thinking about relationships I don’t know about or people I’ve never met, regrets he’s never told anyone and maybe never will. Or maybe he’s thinking about promises by moonlight and an ankle that’s still bothering him a little.

Not that I’d be able to tell either way.

I mutter in mixed jealous frustration and astoundment at his veritable work of art.

Robert simpers smugly at me.

“Not so easy, huh?” he says.

I huff. “Still an old man’s hobby.”

Robert shoots me with an indignant look, then we break into laughter so hard we get glared at by the people a few lots over. The parking area is mostly empty, so the actual disturbance is minimal, and it’s not like anyone here has never seen _Jaws_ before. 

Robert gets a better look at the not-a-duck I’m making and sets his knife, block, and cigarette to the side. In a slow, fluid motion, his hand fits around my wrist, and I go rigid.

“Here, you’re holding it wrong,” he tells me smoothly.

From rigid to limp in the beat of a thumping heart, Robert shifts closer to me until both arms fit neatly around my sides. This isn’t the first time I’ve felt him against me, no. Just last week I carried him through the woods and over a hill, basically all the way to grandma’s house, but here? One of his pectoral muscles presses up between my shoulder blades— _wow, that’s really firm_ —and he guides my hands into a better position.

“Like this. See? Remember, you wanna go _with_ the grain, not against it.” His hold is firm, but not rough. He lines his fingers up with mine, nearly covering them, and changes the way they fit on the handle of the knife he gave me. He tilts our other hands, realigns the wood, and slides the blade smoothly along it in one long sweep. “Like that. Don’t fight with nature, work with it. Sometimes wood’s already got an idea of what it wants to be; help it come out.”

“Think it wants to be a duck?”

Robert huffs just once, a smile in the sound, and it sends a wave of balmy, warm air down my neck. Don’t shiver, don’t shiver, don’t shiver—! I shiver. Hard.

A low hum vibrates through him and up my back. Just play it cool, I tell myself, knowing full well cool is the last thing I am.

“Probably not anymore,” he chuckles.

“Any ideas?” Somehow my voice is not shaking. That’s a good start.

He hums. “Maybe a dog?”

“Or a wolf?”

_FREAKIN—!_

Robert is silent. The only sound that passes between us is the soft, rhythmic cycle of breath. Inhale, exhale. Right beside my ear. Oh my god I feel like my head is going to explode.

“Yeah, I can see it in there somewhere,” he says, head tilted just a little bit one way. “Maybe sitting so you don’t break off a leg.”

“I could make it howling?”

Robert nods.

It’s either the realization of our situation that makes him let go and sidle back to his side of the mat, or it’s because he trusts me to know what to do next. Or at least he’ll find my ultimate failure at turning dick-duck into a majestic wolf amusing while it unfolds. Either way, the abrupt loss of a warm body pressed up against me does send a less noticeable shiver down my spine. Small mercies, I tell myself, it’s what you live on.

I don’t feel like I’m doing anything right, but I keep my hands how he positioned them and run the blade along the wood block in the best pantomime of his movement as I can manage. Deciphering the shape I have to work with, how the grain of wood is directed, and how much I’ll have to shave off to get the shapes I need, I do the best I can. I’m not going to do well—I’m still new to this—so I’m content to wind up with a wonky something-or-other by the end.

I brush a small pile of pine shavings out of my lap and start to feel like I’m making progress. There’s a neck, a body, and what might turn into the makings of a head—maybe a bit too oblong, but I can still fix it—and I allow myself to feel a kind of fatherly pride over my tiny creation.

At least until the shark jumps out of the water and eats a little kid on a yellow raft. Dramatic music plays, screams, panicked running, and wild splashes over loud speakers jolt me out of my concentration. My immediate thought is, _Wow, that was a close one,_ because I don’t feel anything. Then I notice my hand getting wet from the hot red liquid pouring out of the slice in the meaty section of my pointer finger. That’s about when the pain hits.

Yep, blood is _still_ not my thing.

“Oh my god, this is it, this is how I die,” I stammer dramatically, clutching the slice to stem the flow. “Goodbye, cruel world. Robert, I have to tell you something. It was me, Jimmy Hoffa, the whole time. I used age regression therapy to hide my identity, but my time has finally come. Tell the judge everything goes to my daughter and her future dogs.”

Robert notices and shakes his head at me.

He pulls the first aid kit out from next to him, resupplied and at the ready ahead of time for just such an occasion. He cleans me up with a freshly uncapped water bottle and has me put pressure on the cut with a bandana—a black paisley one this time—until a clot forms and I can safely show him how bad it is.

“I don’t know, Jimmy, it looks pretty bad,” Robert tells me, turning my hand in his as I face him. It’s not as bad as the first time I did this. “I’ll tell ‘em you fought the good fight. A people’s man to the end.”

“God speed, my friend, and thank you.”

Robert slathers some antiseptic on it, wraps it in gauze, and holds it all together with an adhesive strip decked out in black and pink Hello Kitty. All of a sudden I can’t stop grinning.

“I don’t even know why I’m surprised you would keep the soothing smile of Hello Kitty with you at all times,” I say between gut shaking giggles.

Robert is grinning, too. “Just can’t go wrong with that creepy lil kitty.”

Finishing putting the strip in place, he pats my hand like you do before you tell the other person to walk it off, freezes, and gingerly slides his hand out of the way. His fore and middle fingers graze my palm, sliding along the narrow ridge of raised, pinkish skin, and pauses everything, even his breath, to look at it. Blood rushes into my cheeks and ears, and I reflexively try to close my hand, but the tape is restrictive and, oh hell, he’s holding it so gently and it feels so _nice_. Suddenly my mind floods with all the other places I want those hands to be.

Memory of his fingers carding up my spine, soft fur standing at attention where they pass upward against the grain. The shiver it elicits is not subtle. When he lets his weight into my hold, trusting that his trust will not be misplaced, I’m struck by the knowledge that Robert Small is simultaneously heavier and smaller than I expected him to be. He is not a light man, but he’s heavy in all the _right_ places.

“Startin’ to think maybe you should keep a kit on you at all times,” Robert says flatly. His thumb absentmindedly traces the raised line of the scar, and I wonder vaguely if he was serious by the comment he made once about knowing knife wounds when he sees them. “This need stitches?”

“Oh, absolutely. A glorious amount. You should have seen the other guy. Hedges never looked so terrified.”

He snickers, but his concern is not insincere.

I smile. “Nah, turns out it was just weirdly placed. Alex was an ER nurse. I’m a bit danger prone, so he taught me and Amanda some nonemergency first aid. There’s not much moral support and a little superglue can’t fix. Although, looking back, some Hello Kitty band-aids would have been super.”

Robert offers a hum of agreement, smirks. “Hey, a little danger is good for you. Keeps your heart strong.”

I’ve got to agree there. I did bite the hell out of a bear last week.

“Then I must have one strong ticker because ‘Danger’ is my middle name,” I exclaim proudly.

Robert breaks out into a fit of laughter so hearty I can’t resist joining in. It’s made all the funnier by the fact Chief Brody has just been slapped by the mother of the shark’s latest victim, and I’m sure to the other movie-goers it must look like we find the tragedy hilarious. Somehow that makes it all the more morbid and funny.

Robert leans back in his place against the window, one arm propped on a raised knee, and cracks into another can of beer after handing me one for myself. It’s a good brand, smooth and flavorful, and I like that we can take the drinking slow for a night. As nice as whiskey is, I do enjoy a slower progression of events, too.

While sipping on my beer, I examine my little almost-figurine. It kind of has a canine shape to it. Vaguely in a sitting position with what might be a head raised vertically. But now it sports a rusty brownish-red stain on one of its legs. A stain that, I realize with a frown, is mostly relegated to one of its paws. The _same_ paw. Grumbling internally, I set it under the corner of the futon mat along with my closed pocket knife and enjoy a cold beer, good company, and a great movie.

Chief Brody’s ploy to save lives is ignored. The shark eats more citizens. The mayor is too busy doing what’s best for the town to do what’s best for the people. Quint is drunk, smug, and exactly the do-it-yourself-and-do-it-right kind of person the audience needs.

 _Do it yourself,_ I think while a knot forms in my throat. Because alcohol always makes me think of great ideas.

_Not just my secret. All cryptids._

_We. Do. Not. Exist._

“Speaking of danger prone.” I break off from the lip of my beer and rest my hand over my knee. He doesn’t appear too bothered by the interruption. “How’s that quest for the Dover Ghost coming?”

It could be my imagination. Probably is. Maybe I’m just being hyperaware and looking too hard for minute little changes or tells, but I think I see his shoulders tense up. With his jacket slung over the side of the truck, there is one less layer to dampen his body language. Or the view. Because those sleeves are way more snug on his arms than his jacket would ever lead someone to believe.

Robert stares unblinking at the theater screen, brow knitted in thought. He’s utterly undisturbed by the cold night air, yet something else clearly has.

Then, of all things, he shrugs.

“Taking a break for now, actually,” he says with a swig of beer. “Found some bear tracks last time I was out, and Fish and Game haven’t found the thing to relocate it, yet. I ain’t dumb enough to risk a bear attack, so I’m staying in until that mess gets sorted out. Plus, I don’t know, a bear kinda accounts for what we might’ve heard and seen that one time.”

I blink once. Twice. Thirty times in rapid succession.

Totally flabbergasted, “You would fight Mothman out back of a McFridayz and be the happiest man alive, but you get chased out of the woods you love by _one_ black bear?” I ask incredulously.

He half covers his mouth with a tattooed wrist, snickering gruffly at what must be an incredible mental image, and gives me a sidelong look. “Could be a grizzly.”

I raise an eyebrow at him. “This side of the Great Lakes? C’mon, we could go together! Buddy system and all that. Be responsible like good boy scouts.”

Robert shakes his head. “Not this time, John. Knives ain’t any good against a bear, and I don’t have anything better. ‘Til then, I’m grounded, and so are you.”

Against a bear, oh, no, a knife would never do. But against _me_? Oh, hell yeah, that’ll work just fine.

I have to force myself to frown even as my stomach flips and flutters.

“What if I got us some bear mace? Then we could—”

I stop myself when Robert faces me. Now, there isn’t any mirth in his eyes. Brow furrowed in the middle, he fixes me with a hard look.

I sigh, pretend to be disappointed. “Alright. Sorry I pushed.”

He pats me on the shoulder. “’S fine. Trust me, I wanna be out there, too, but I made a promise to the Game Warden. Don’t go out there by yourself, either, ‘kay? Isn’t safe right now.”

I can’t help but smile at his masterclass of trickery. _Game Warden,_ he says, and because “don’t go by yourself” implies “go with me” and that suggests a scenario that is both suspiciously date-like and one where he can keep an eye on me. Make sure we don’t go anywhere or find anything we shouldn’t. Anything that maybe doesn’t want to be found.

“I’ll be sure to take you with me when I plan on being reckless,” I tell him, utterly honest and practically dripping with joy.

Robert smiles at me. God, _at me_. He squeezes my shoulder, leans back, and lays his arms out on the lip where the truck bed and rear window meet. A move that, conveniently, leaves his arm slung across my shoulders. A brazen move I’m all too happy to reward by leaning into.

“No more talkin’,” Robert murmurs. “’S gettin’ to the good parts.”

A statement he makes while not looking anywhere near the screen.

* * *

It’s late, or early depending on your outlook. I’m getting kind of tired, but when Robert suggests we sober up by taking a walk down by the marina I immediately accept. It, of course, is closed, but the security guard also happens to be dead asleep in his booth, so it’s not like we’re met with resistance.

Part of me wants to be responsible. I’m a parent. My daughter needs good role models, and I’m the first place she looks. I do my best to eat right and go on runs as often as I can, pay bills a week early, and get home before she wakes up for school so it can at least appear I’ve gone to bed at a reasonable hour. So, naturally, when I read the _Open 6am – 8pm_ sign, it registers as my cue to turn around and find someplace else to loiter.

That’s what a normal, wholesome person would do.

But that’s only one part of me, and it’s not a very big one. Because the rest of me is standing here at the marina entrance watching Robert tilt his head sideways at the laminated _Closed – Do Not Enter_ sign shoddily zip tied to a nylon rope stretched across the entrance to the boat ramp, and I know full well that whatever he’s going to do I am going to do, too.

Robert takes one more drag, stubs his cigarette out on the top of a post, and drops it in a corroded tin can nailed to the post for that very purpose. Casual as can be, he dips down low and comes up on the other side of the rope. Eyeballing me from the opposite side of the tracks, he takes one finger and holds the rope up like a true gentleman.

I duck underneath and come up alongside him. He releases the slack looking endlessly pleased.

“There’s that wild,” Robert says to me proudly.

I smirk. If he only knew.

The marina is old, and it shows in the weather worn planks of wood as we walk side by side down the boardwalk. Things creak and groan softly beneath us like a tide-driven serenade. Every few steps one of us will step on a plank that will squeak off key from the others, like a high note that spices up the melody. There’s even a point where we both step on the same plank in unison, and either end makes a creak of a different tune. Our eyes lock, communicating with nothing more than cheeky, ear-wide smirks, and simultaneously rock back and forward on the offending foot. The board groans spectacularly, and I cover my mouth to suppress a child-like giggle as Robert’s shoulders rock jovially.

Everything is so peaceful. There is wind, gentle waves lapping at the tide walls and support beams. It’s too early even for the fishermen to be prepping their boats for the day, so the docks are utterly deserted. Some boats have smart, gaudy names like: _Poseidon’s Bane_ , _Triton_ , _Harbinger_ , _The Galleon_ , and other such glorious titles. Then there are cute ones: _Sammy Lee_ , _Lady Lola_ , _The Salty Kitten_ , _Shark B8_ , _Rachel’s Bae_ , and countless more.

Further down, the docks widen as the boats housed there get increasingly bigger and more ornate until, at the far side, a line of yachts are docked, casually bobbing in the lapping waves; they fit in about as well as a diamond fits on a fifty-cent, nickel-plated ring. I’d be lying if I said I didn’t want to take a closer look over there, maybe look in at some of the finer luxuries that I’ll never be able to afford, but long before we reach that area of pier Robert hangs a left and leads me down a section of dock lined on either side by rustic, somewhat dilapidated fishing dinghies and an antique sailboat that has seen better centuries.

All around us it smells like salt water, fish, low tide, oil, and sun bleached wood. They’re strong smells, but with a constant breeze to ward off stagnation they are far from unpleasant. Really, they’re lovely. Refreshing even. The air is cleaner here than most of the town, especially at night when all the engines are off. Perhaps not so clear as in the deep woods, but still nice.

Seabirds roost wherever they have space to do so. Congregations of pelicans, seagulls, and other shore birds rest atop posts, on the bows and seats of boats, atop canopies, and nestled in heaping piles of fishing nets and on crab traps. A pelican stirs and reluctantly hobbles out of the way as we approach on heavy, clomping feet. It swoops lazily off the edge of the dock, flapping quietly away to find a new place to roost.

We stop when the dock comes to an end. The final two lots unoccupied for the night, and it leaves us with an uninterrupted view to the rest of the harbor. This dock stretches a good distance out into the bay. Ahead of us: calm dark waters, the lighthouse tower that twinkles as it spins, connected to land by a small manmade jetty that looks like a tall wake might wash it away, and beyond that is endless moon-soaked ocean.

I look over at Robert. He’s leaning on one of the high pillars that supports the end of the dock, thumbs hooked through his belt loops, expression quiet and unreadable.

“You wanna go for a swim?” I ask him, wondering if that’s the reason we’re here.

He breaks concentration enough to give me a raised eyebrow. “Not afraid the shark’ll get you?”

“Nah.” I am petrified of that possibility.

Robert chuckles, shakes his head. “The fact you think that’s a good idea is exactly why we’re not gonna do that.”

“Aww, party pooper.” Man, it’s honestly cute when Robert pretends to be the responsible one. “Then what’d we come out here for?”

Robert shrugs. “Got someplace better to be?”

I don’t. Well, maybe in bed, but that’s not as much fun.

He nudges himself off the pillar and takes a seat at the edge of the dock, feet dangling over the side. The tide is mostly out, so even the tallest waves don’t reach the bottoms of his boots. He pats the empty spot beside him, and I sit without a word. Robert looks pleased by that, gazes out over the water, and breathes in slow through his nose.

It’s nice. The breeze ruffles gentle fingers through hair and clothes, bringing with it the smells of the ocean. No bird sounds, no bugs, no engines, no people. Just gently lapping waves, breeze, and the occasional splash of an unseen fish. Somewhere on one of the bigger boats, a brass bell softly clings when it lists to one side, but it happens so seldom it hardly warrants notice.

Caught up in the peacefulness of the night, I lie back on the dock, arms splayed out on either side of me and stare up at the starry sky. There is some glare from the marina lights behind us, but the constellations are all there. Bright and twinkling and lovely. Big Dipper, Little Dipper, Orion, and . . . that’s all I can recognize without a chart. Man, I’d get lost at sea so easy. Maybe I should read more on the techniques of ancient seafarers.

“Thanks for bringing me out tonight, Robert,” I say quietly, barely loud enough to hear over the gentle splash of the waves beneath the dock.

He hums a general reply. “You’re welcome. Looked like you could use some time out of the house.”

Eyes closed, I smile. Not like I haven’t been doing plenty of that lately. He must have heard about my latest bout with food poisoning. According to Hugo, I’m prone to it; something about I need to take better care of my intestinal flora. Even Damien has offered his expertise on apothecary-style nausea remedies to stave off vomiting should it happen again. Much as I enjoy being doted on once in a while, I don’t actually want their efforts to go to waste.

I get out of the house plenty.

I look over at him, but he hasn’t taken his eyes off the stretch of open water between the lighthouse and the shore. “So this was just for my benefit? You didn’t actually want to come?” My tone is light and teasing.

His eyes flash over to me, corner of his mouth pulling just slightly towards his ear.

“I don’t do anything I don’t wanna do,” Robert says. I believe it.

“I can tell.” Stretching my legs out straight, I rifle through one of my pockets before kicking myself into a sitting position. He looks at the contents of my hand when I hold it out. On the walk here, I collected a number of cool looking rocks—something I apparently do when I’m drunk—but now that we’ve sobered up some it feels stupid to bring them home. “Want to throw rocks at shit again?”

Robert looks at the assortment of curiously shaped and colored pebbles, chuckles, and picks one out of the middle. “What’s the target?”

I point to a _Slow – No Wake_ sign tacked high on a post about twenty yards from the dock. The challenge it poses is a satisfactory one. 

“Wanna make it more interesting?” he asks, head tilted one way.

“Sure.”

“Whoever hits the sign most wins. Loser buys drinks.”

I snort with surprising force, and Robert looks at me oddly.

“You said it’d be interesting,” I giggle. “Robert, we do that _all the time_. C’mon, spice it up a little!”

If I didn’t know him better, I’d think the offended look he gives me is genuine. But I do, and it’s not. 

“Alright, wise guy.” His buzz is inhibiting his ability to hide expressions, especially the grinning kind. “What’s your big idea?”

Oh, it’s a big one alright. Because alcohol _always_ makes my ideas sound so grand.

I plant an ostentatious wink in his direction. “Winner gets a kiss?”

Robert’s eyes go wide before he can rein it in, and damn if that isn’t such a satisfying sight to behold. He stares at me, thunderstruck, and asks, “Are you serious?”

I lean back on my hands, shrug. “Sure.”

He shakes his head slowly. “You’re drunker’n I thought.”

Now that makes me laugh a little. I get back to my feet, one hand braced on the opposite pole for balance, and take a better bearing on how far the sign is from where we are. Totally doable, I think as I empty all the pebbles from my pockets, divide them evenly, and set up two neat piles.

“You’d be surprised,” I tell him. Alcohol is the smallest cause of my high spirits right now.

I lob one pebble idly up and down while Robert sternly contemplates the pile nearest to him. The hesitance brings up some doubts, and I wonder with increasing dread if I’ve gone too far with this. Robert is not the cute and mushy type—adorable dog and fruity taste in pizza aside—and the longer he stares unblinkingly between the pebbles and the _No Wake_ sign the more palpable my worries become.

At least until he stands, sloughs off his leather jacket and sunglasses, and scoops up his handful. Plastered across his face is the biggest fail at an attempt not to smirk in the history of anything.

“Aright,” Robert merely agrees.

I practically beam. Less at the prospect of our proposed reward and more about one of my ideas coming to fruition.

“There’s that wild,” I gleam.

He chuckles. “My wild never left, kid. Get on my level.”

He’s so confident about it, it spurs on my competitive side and my grin splits so wide across my face my cheeks burn from the strain.

“Oh, you’re goin’ _down_ , Small,” I assert, backing up a little for the best place to put my feet, stretch my arms a little.

He leers sideways at me then, and it’s impossible to miss when his eyes scan me over in a full head-tummy-toe sweep. One eyebrow quirked, “That an invitation?”

My smile drops as my cheeks blaze red hot.

Robert snorts. “Guess not.”

“Kiss my ass.”

“Not if I win.”

I take the liberty of starting us off and send my first rock sailing in a high arc over the water, but sadly it falls short and drops into the waves with a pathetic little spike of water. Robert says nothing about the catastrophic start, and I might be overly prepared to chalk it up to the sign being too far away until Robert winds his arm back and sends his stone hurdling. It strikes with a sharp _ping_ on the sign’s metal surface, the reflective face wavering the marina lights back at us.

We look at each other. Robert looks pleased; I must look disgruntled. I just blame it on my bandage.

Turns out all I needed was for my arm to figure out the right amount of strength to throw with because four throws later and we’re tied 2 – 2 with half our stones depleted.

“Surrender now, my friend, for there is no winning for you,” I taunt light-heatedly. “Victory shall be mine!”

“You gotta work on your trash talk,” Robert chuffs, toying the smooth top of one pebble with his thumb while he waits for me to take my turn.

I curl my arm back and send the rock through the air. It’s oddly shaped, though, so it curves right, glances off the side of the pole, and plunks into the water. I glower at the tiny ripples it leaves behind.

Robert takes his shot. The rock _tinks_ like a wind chime where it hits. The reflection reveals a tiny dent placed perfectly in the W’s cleft.

Don’t get disgruntled. Be proud of his incredible arm, I tell myself. Because, well, dang his arms _are_ incredible.

“Trash talk is unsportsmanlike,” I assert. “I prefer putting on a show for the audience.”

He purses one eyebrow and raises the other like he has no idea what I’m talking about. “What audience?”

I throw my arms out wide, chest puffed towards the ocean. “This audience! I mean, look at it, it’s beautiful. It’s endless. It could be Jaws, or maybe it’s mermaids—no way there isn’t something here watching us pelt the crap out of this defenseless sign.”

Robert smirks and chuckles lightly. “Alright, showboat. Show your admirers whatcha got.”

I lean back for some extra oomph, winding myself up like a spring trap.

“This one’s for all the mermaids out there!” I hurl the rock with all I’ve got. It sails high in a wide arch. Too high, as a matter of fact. It clears the top of the sign and falls sadly into the water behind the pillar.

“Nice arm. Bad aim.” Robert crosses his arms over his chest and sniggers sideways at me. “I’m sure the mermaids will forgive you.”

I groan, grateful merfolk aren’t the type to take offerings in their name to heart.

Luckily for my ego, Robert misses his shot, too, but reminds me he still has the current lead. We each have two rocks remaining.

Still feeling the cheeky one of the conversation, I decide to probe a little.

“So, I know your stance on Mothman,” I start, “but what do you think about mermaids?”

Robert breaks from his internal debate over which of his rocks to throw next. He thinks on it, shrugs, and decides on the gray one. “Mothman’s bullshit. Mermaids are probably bullshit, too.”

My jaw drops in mock indignation. “Have you ever actually _seen_ one?”

“Nope. ‘S why they’re bullshit.”

I prop my hands on my hips. “What about the Flathead Lake Monster? Have you seen that one?”

He gives me a look over the shoulder. “Have _you_?”

I open my mouth to speak, hesitate, close my mouth, and drop into a frown. I, in fact, have not.

Robert laughs so fully his shoulders quake and his eyes close. My hand goes to my chest as if that’s somehow supposed to quell the choreographed backflips it’s performing.

_Sweet stars, tonight is a great night._

Robert reminds me it’s my throw, and with a satiny feeling of good vibes in my belly I let my rock fly free. It strikes the sign with a sharp _twang_ , and I immediately throw my arms up with a boisterous whoop. He shakes his head at me, takes his shot, and I listen for the metallic tone of success, but it misses the pillar completely and falls flat into the water.

I can’t even remember what we were competing for; I’m just genuinely having a shameless amount of fun over throwing rocks into a marina where we are legally trespassing. All I know is we’re tied with one rock left to each of us. I’m riding a high and I can barely contain it, bobbing excitedly on the balls of my feet. I must look half crazed to Robert, but if he cares at all he doesn’t let on. Just shakes his head like you do when your buddy’s being a doof.

Needless to say, when I throw my last rock and it strikes the sign with an acutely satisfying _twang_ , my heart flutters a bit more fully.

“Maybe we shoulda clarified what would happen if there was a tie,” Robert says, cocking his head as he looks out at our remarkably resilient target. He fiddles his little red rock between his thumb and forefinger.

I raise both arms in a shrug and sidestep to give him more room. “Pretty sure even a lose-lose is also a win- _ **wIN**_ —!?”

Every organ in my body lurches into my throat when my foot slips on the edge of one of the dock planks, and I lose my footing. I windmill one arm and scramble for the post closest to me. Just when I feel gravity roping me down, something big and fast snatches me around the waist and yanks me back from the brink. We stagger a few steps, something clatters then plunks into the water, and when my heart stops pounding and my knees stop shaking I’m able to release just a little of the death grip I have around his back, forehead slumped onto his shoulder.

“What was that about you bein’ danger prone?” Robert chuckles.

Once I have faculties enough to make noises, I groan exasperatedly into his shirt. “Wasn’t lying. ‘Danger’ really is my middle na. . . .”

I trail off after picking my head up, and Robert and I come nose to nose. Our eyes widen. We stare at each other. Everything smells like sea salt, leather, smoke, and cool night air. He’s warm. Everything is warm. From his breath on my cheek to his chest against mine and our hands on each other’s backs.

Dark eyes are reflecting the marina lights. There’s color creeping into his face. His lips are lightly parted. I can’t take my eyes off of them.

My heart stutters in my throat as my eyes drift shut; I see his slowly closing, too. I lean in.

His stubble brushes the side of my face, strong hands grip tighter around my back, and Robert sets his chin on my shoulder. I open my eyes without ever having realized when I went so rigid, recognize with stunning clarity that I’ve been dodged, and sag gracelessly into his arms. He accepts my weight with ease, tightens his grip further.

Robert murmurs into the crook of my neck, “You’re still drunk, John.”

I want to argue. God, I want so badly for that not to be true. Only manage to groan, “Maybe just a little. Still your turn.”

He lets his breath out, the heat of it prickling the skin up the side of my neck. “Can’t. I dropped my last rock.”

I sigh, lean my face into his shoulder, and wind my arms as far as they’ll reach to grip behind his shoulders. If I can’t kiss him fair and square, then dammit I can at least have this.

This. Just this. It’s okay. It’s enough.

It’s enough because it’s him. He’s here, and he’s holding onto me so tightly it’s like he has his own gravitational pull, and it’s complimenting mine.

When it’s clear I’m not going to fall off the dock again, Robert slowly releases me. I let go half a beat after him, hoping he didn’t notice if I lingered too long. It doesn’t seem like he did.

“Let’s get you home,” he says softly.

I don’t argue. I watch him slip smoothly back into his jacket, replace his sunglasses, and follow him back towards the boardwalk. 

We’re halfway to the entrance when there’s a small splash. Nothing out of the ordinary in a modest marina like this. Except for the immediate clatter of something hard rolling on the dock behind us.

We both stop. Robert looks at me questioningly, but I give him a shrug of equal confusion. He walks around me, scanning the environment with a critical eye. Lit by the yellow, moth infested glow of the light posts, we track a few steps back and that’s when the small trail of darker, damp wood becomes clear. It leads from the edge of the dock and ends at a point like something has rolled, and it definitely wasn’t there a few seconds ago. About a foot from where the trail starts sits a small red pebble.

I deadpan as Robert gawks.

 _Speaking of mermaids,_ I think. My guts clench and gaze darts out over the marina. Everything is still. Seabirds sleep in undisturbed clusters. Barely even the wind disturbs the twinkling, glassy water.

Robert picks the rock up and inspects its shiny wet surface. He looks around, at the spatter of wet leading off the dock, glances at me when he thinks I won’t notice, and cranes his neck to look straight up. I follow his lead, but there’s nothing. No winking plane lights, no bats, bugs, and all the birds are sleeping restfully. And the only other human about is the night guard snoring up an orchestra.

I stare at Robert, to the water trail, to the rock in his hand, and acknowledge the elephant because it would be weirder not to, “So . . . that’s weird. . . . That’s weird, right?”

Robert rolls the rock between his fingers. “Bird musta dropped it,” he mutters simply.

Of course. It’s pure coincidence that this rock looks identical to the one he dropped, down to color and shape. And, hey, a suspicious wet trail leading back into the water after talking about mermaids within earshot of the open ocean definitely means we were targeted by a bird with a bad aim and not an aquatic cryptid with a sense of humor. But I suppose that’s the first conclusion a rational mind might come to.

I just nod.

But Robert doesn’t immediately turn back. Rather, he twiddles the rock for a moment, staring at it intently, and looks back down the dock where we were a moment before. Without a word, he curls his arm back and whips the pebble back the way we came. It makes it maybe halfway before it smacks into the mast of the rickety old sail boat, clatters to the bow where it startles a cluster of seagulls, and drops into the water with a tiny _plunk_.

I cock my head dumbly at him and offer up my clearest _Now what was that supposed to accomplish?_ look. 

Robert only shrugs, slips his hands into their pockets. “I missed.”

* * *

The drive back isn’t long, but the lilting serenade of Tom Waits and our cacophonous sing-along fills the silence all the way there. Robert pulls into my driveway, wedges the gear shift into park, and I slide out of my seat to the ground.

“Thanks for bringing me out tonight,” I say casually. Tom Waits croons softly over the radio, and I can’t get the smile off my face. No reward necessary; it was a great night. “I had fun.”

Robert nods. 

I go to shut the door, but Robert stops me.

“Hey.”

I pause. “Yeah?”

“Forgetting something?”

I stare at him for a second, racking my brain for what I could possibly be forgetting. I pat my pockets, but my phone, knife, and wallet are all accounted for. But Robert shakes his head no and holds his hand out. In it is a small oblong figurine, and I recognize my duck-dick-wolf from earlier tonight. I smile embarrassedly, and Robert unclips his buckle and scoots so I don’t have to reach as far to take it. It’s such a dinky, lopsided thing. There’s that ridiculous blood stain on its forepaw, and it probably looks even more like someone’s genitals now than when I still meant for it to be a duck.

“Thanks, Ro—” I start to say, cut short when a hand cups the back of my head and tugs me forward.

I gape unblinking at my stunned reflection in a pair of orange lenses. Warm breath ruffles my hair while the soft heat of lips presses into the top of my head. He lingers half a beat too long, and I’m still gawking when he draws back, looks at me with color on his cheeks and a new kind of smile on his lips.

“Get some sleep, Danger,” he tells me.

“You, too,” is literally all I can manage, and I’m impressed I can even do that.

He backs out of my driveway and immediately into his, closes his door with a crisp slam, and waves on his way to the front of his house. I wave back absently, turn, and robotically navigate my way inside, out of my shoes, out of the bandage on my finger, and towards my bedroom.

Bones crack and tendons pop once the door is shut. I flop into bed, head on the pillows and legs hanging off the end. The reinforced frame doesn’t make a sound when it intercepts my weight. For hours it feels like all I can do is stare wide eyed into the blue-gray shadows that paint my ceiling. No lights on anywhere in the house, but in the patterns of drywall a million nonsensical shapes take form. A pineapple, a bear, a pixie and a shark, a schoolbus, an old man in a gray beard and toga. So much more and more meaningless.

It starts out slow. A sigh, a quirk of the muscles in my face. Then all at once I’m smiling so shamelessly wide I think my face might actually get stuck that way. And, hey, that doesn’t sound like such a bad idea all of a sudden. My breath leaves my chest in a slow, voluminous exhale that swiftly devolves into a low, windy chuckle.

I roll onto my side and take my little figurine off the bedside table—it’s barely the size of one of my fingers. It takes a moment, but I finally realize what it has been missing all this time. With a careful swipe of my thumb claw, I etch a small, sweeping smile along its muzzle.

* * *

It’s strawberry pancakes for breakfast when Amanda comes out of her room dressed for school. She breathes the smell in so deep I think she might actually inhale the pink stack that’s already been set aside for her.

“She lives,” I greet her cheerily, flipping the newest cake with a magnificent sizzle.

I barely slept. My heart’s been racing all morning, and the half pot of coffee in me probably isn’t helping any. I wonder if it shows.

“Something happen I don’t know about?” (Yep.) Amanda hurriedly drops into the first seat at the counter. She’s smiling. Smiling from ear to ear because I am, too. Because strawberries always mean good things. “Wait, don’t tell me. The feds have finally lost the trail. Your life of pun crime will forever go unpunished!”

I laugh. “Even better.”

Taking a plate already piled four stacks high, I top off the masterpiece off with a heaping helping of whipped cream, sliced whole strawberries, and an overly generous side of bacon. There might actually be stars in her eyes when I slide the plate in front of her. Amanda proceeds to drown it in a veritable lake of maple syrup and dives in face first. 

While she dines like a queen, I pop bacon into my mouth like candy and use the last of the batter to make myself a heaping plate and devour it, too. It isn’t quite as glorious as Amanda’s, but it doesn’t need to be.

When she finally comes up for air, her pancakes and all accompanying sides are thoroughly demolished. I lick some dribbled syrup from the side of my finger where only a thin pink line marks a spot where, a few hours ago, a nasty slice was oozing thick red blood.

No further ado, I put my plate in the sink and lay my hands out on the countertop.

“Manda Panda, you were right,” I tell her proudly.

She blinks, looks at me like I have suddenly sprouted a third eye, and sits back in her chair to give her tummy the room it needs to expand around all that delicious pancake. “I was?” She starts then swiftly throws on her victory face. “I mean—uh, of course I was! I’m right about a lot of things. Especially that thing. The one I told you about. The thing. The important one that we definitely discussed recently. The important one. That one.”

I giggle. She woke up, what, twenty minutes ago? Of course she doesn’t know what I’m talking about.

Feeling merciful, I clarify. “I got to talk to Robert.”

Her eyes go wide, jaw drops to the counter. “You—what—really?—how?—”

“Oh god, honey, no. No, no, not about that. I got to _test_ him. On the promise.”

Her mouth goes from unhinged to something more “o” shaped.

“And?” she asks eagerly, already at the edge of her seat.

It must be the way I’m practically beaming that gives it away, unable to hold it in while bouncing on the balls of my feet. Because the smile splits across her face again, and she jumps to her feet so fast her hands slam the counter and make her glass and silverware rattle.

“I told you! Park Ranger for the win!” she exclaims jubilantly.

I laugh. Not only at her enthusiasm, but because I was wrong. I was wrong, and I’ve never been so happy for it.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So I am 1000% for mermaids playing matchmaker with other cryptids.
> 
> Also I'm going to try to upload on a schedule as best I can, but since I work full time and my job can be grueling it will be a tentative weekly schedule with time and energy permitting. Thank you all again for being so awesome and supportive! More goodness to come and soon!


	8. The Ghost You Know the Most

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> All roads converge at the place we met.  
> At these crossroads: one path leads to peace while the other to peril. With the shock of a harrowing revelation, both will be forced to choose a single path, but will it be in the same direction?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Click [here](http://crescentmoondemon.tumblr.com/post/165566760598#notes) for John’s canon appearance.
> 
> Link to the [Terminology Master Post](http://crescentmoondemon.tumblr.com/post/165422480878#notes).

The night is cool. The moon is waning. Animals are out in abundance, making their calls and searching for food—living. They dart and scatter as I race past, careening headlong up the hill. No deer are out tonight. Maybe they’ve gotten wise and moved somewhere safer, someplace where there are bears, but I do scare the striped, fluffy tail off a trash-fattened raccoon. 

For once, the course of my run is not aimless. I have a destination in mind. While I’m operating only on a hunch, it’s bolstered by the knowledge that his truck was not in the driveway when I left. He’s out tonight. Somewhere. But that’s just the theory.

My tongue hangs from the side of my mouth as I race at full speed. Claws dig sharply into the ground and catch a root, yanking me to an abrupt stop at the cusp of the tree line. I peek left through the cover of dense underbrush. Nothing. I peer right. Nothing. I listen hard. Silence. Only crickets.

I dart across the road on all fours, stroll nonchalantly on two legs past the truck with its quiet engine, and lean my paws on the wooden guardrail. The sky is clear. Stars and moon shine bright. The city is the same: so well illuminated it seems to reflect the night sky back to itself. Glinting yellow street and houselights like small stars, nearer than the heavens yet still an eternity away from this distant little haven. Pines and oaks grow tall all around, framing the view of the town, my town, against the backdrop of rolling hills, endless water, and twirling, blinking light of the lighthouse stretched out into the bay.

On the other side of the guardrail, I learned after a solo trip, the ground doesn’t end in a sheer drop but the slope of a moderately steep hill. Too much for a vehicle to climb but not enough to deter an intrepid adventurer.

Or a stubbornly handsome, leather-clad man and his valiant boston terrier.

I rap the rail with my claws, and Betsy’s ears prick up before lifting her head from its sleepy curl in the grass at her master’s side. She jumps at what she sees leaning over the post twenty feet above, barks once, and jolts Robert out of what must have been such a peaceful moment. He whips his head around and about jumps out of his skin, letting out a startled and vile stream of profanity that has me chuckling already.

Robert drops his hand from his chest, breathes, and waves me over.

I descend the slope on all fours, but before taking my seat I extend my hand for Betsy to sniff. She does, and her tail goes crazy almost immediately. She licks my knuckles as Robert watches, snuffs his cigarette in the grass, and buries it with his boot heel. Betsy is happy to receive some clawed pets as I sit, her wiggly butt planted between Robert and I.

 _“How’s your leg?”_ I ask.

“Fine.” The fact he has made it this far on his own should speak for itself, and he wasn’t limping the other night at the marina.

Robert has his knife and a small piece of pinewood. It’s already taking shape into a cute little whale, complete with the makings of a shallow dorsal fin and a forward-curving fluke. At my apparent interest, he glances my way and holds it out, flicking his knife shut. I take it without a word; it looks so tiny in my hand compared to his. I run the pad of a finger over the angular spots that have yet to be etched or ground smooth, the bulkier areas at the bottom that might soon become pectoral fins, and pencil marks on the head that mark where the eyes and mouth will eventually go.

 _“Cute.”_ I hand it back to him, absolutely not jealous in anyway because I can’t whittle my way out of a wet paper bag. _“You come all the way up here just to make that?”_

“Nope,” he says simply. “Can’t you tell? I’m cryptid hunting.”

My brow goes through a range of expressions from raised almost to my ears, quirked confusedly, and finally furrowed at the middle. Robert must have witnessed every minute change because he chuckles and rubs Betsy on the head, causing her ears to flap side to side as her tongue hangs blissfully.

“Betsy’s in on the gig, too. You can keep a secret, can’t you, girl?”

She barks.

Alright, I’ll give him that.

 _“What are you looking for?”_ Not that there isn’t an obscene abundance of creatures to find in these woods, or on this hill in particular, but this doesn’t seem like a likely spot to be poking around for the unseen.

Robert shifts his legs up, rests either arm over his knees, and flicks his knife back out. Using the blade like a pointer, he indicates the sky.

I cock my head, eyebrows raised past my skull in blatant incredulity.

_“Aliens?”_

“Aliens.”

I can’t help it. I laugh. I laugh, and, of all things, I speak. _“Of all the beings I’ve met, I can honestly say I’ve never met aliens before.”_

Here swings wide the lid of Pandora’s Box. Because Robert gapes, lips slightly parted, and fixes me with an expression so thick with astonishment it’s like I’m looking at a totally different person. It may be quickly curtailed into something more calculatedly intrigued, but he’s no less mind-blown.

“What kinda beings have you met?” he asks carefully. “No fooling.”

I consider my options. Answering, not answering. I consider Jaws lurking under the surface of a placid ocean, picking off unsuspecting teens, and how bustling beaches became wastelands after frightened beachgoers learned what could possibly be lurking just below idly kicking feet. 

Mostly, I think about mermaids throwing rocks.

At the bottom of the hill, a dense swath of fireflies flickers and dances to the tune of chirping crickets and softly twittering night birds. No sounds from civilization, no cars pass by, no flashing lights of airplanes in the dark. Their dance follows the rhythm of the breeze through leaves and the serenade of insects and bats. Amid those silent lights I spot flirty little three-flashes answered by teasing two-flashes and blinks, lights that are more yellow than green to a keen eye, and that’s when I notice the amount of intermingled green and yellow.

 _“Fairies,”_ I hum aloud.

Robert gawks. “No shit?”

_“Oh, yeah. Those little guys are everywhere.”_

“Where?”

I look sideways at him, completely unable to temper my amusement. 

Playfully, _“Now, now, that would be in violation of the Cryptid Code of Conduct. Never tell a human where the wild things are. And no one, **no one** , gets on The Don Fairy’s bad side.”_

Robert huffs dubiously but grins. “Never rat on your friends?”

_“Precisely.”_

He nods. “I can respect that.”

I nod back to let him know I’m grateful.

“If you can’t tell me where things are, could you tell me about them?” he asks tentatively, mindful of promises and unspoken boundaries. “Whether they exist or not?”

My smile drops, and I look away. _“I know some things. I don’t know everything.”_

“Shit, ghost, I don’t expect you to tell me everything. Just what you’re comfortable with. Don’t have to answer what you don’t want to,” he tells me bluntly.

I nod again and am midway through that little chin bob when I stop short and whip my head at him. Robert must come to the identical realization as me, because his face skews with a guilty, just-been-caught-doing-something-he-shouldn’t-have stare and leans away.

 _“Did you just . . . call me ‘ghost’?”_ I echo, torn between thunderstruck to have been _named_ and impressed because that is actually a really cool nickname and I would genuinely love to be called by it.

“Uhh,” Robert looks quickly away, scratching uncomfortably at the nape of his neck. The skin there is flushed, and the scent of a million emotions lights him up in the most bewildering way. “That . . . kinda just came out. I can call you something else if . . . or nothing at all.”

He must feel himself about to start rambling, hates that he might, and cuts himself off with a powerful glare that could probably shatter a mirror.

I can’t help it. I snicker, shoulders bobbing up and down. He looks at me awestruck.

 _“I don’t mind. If you really need something to call me by, then you may call me ghost,”_ I decide, enamored by the hint of smile playing at the edges of his mouth. _“It’s kind of fitting, really. All things considered.”_

Robert nods.

“So, fairies do exist?” he asks.

_“They do.”_

“What about the Jersey Devil?”

 _“Jersey Devil **s**. You don’t get hundreds of years worth of sightings without a breeding population, and they were there long before white people ever showed up.”_ A memory of a trip out to Jersey with my mother to visit cousins comes to mind. Our troop of chatty, eager teens gallivanting through the Pine Barrens at top speed to visit family friends I hadn’t seen since I was a puppy. Friends with cloven hooves, hulking leathery wings, spade-tipped tails, and fanged smiles that greet us with open arms and cook us meals that taste like starry nights and a happy home. _“That whole Mother Leeds bit was added on after that poor woman had a kid with a deformity. The midwife convinced her it was a monster and took it into the woods to let it die. A real family of Jersey Devils found the kid and took her in, raised her as one of their own.”_

Robert stares silently at me, his face impossible to read. “Is that true?”

I nod solemnly. _“They’re not terribly fond of humans anymore.”_

He takes that in, stores it away. “Lake monsters?”

Now, that’s a favorite of mine. _“Some exist. Most are mistaken identity. Logs and boat wakes and big fish. Mostly it’s lakes with access to the ocean that have the real ones. Loch Ness is up for debate right now. Nessie hasn’t been spotted in years. Some think they finally went extinct.”_

That gets his gears turning. “Was there a breeding population?”

I shake my head. _“No, that race was parthenogenic, reproduced asexually. Not a great way to preserve the gene pool. I don’t think there was ever more than two or three alive at a time due to the amount of fish in the loch. If there is a Nessie left, it either hasn’t hatched yet or it’s too young to be spotted.”_

Color him utterly enthralled. No longer content with sitting side by side, Robert shifts in his spot, lowering one leg to face me more fully, knife and sculpture forgotten in the grass.

“And Bigfoot?” he prompts. “Or are they as legendary as their croquet game?”

I snort. Can’t help it. The mental image of that giant hairy hominid delicately wielding a croquet mallet will never cease to amuse me. _“Oh, that’s a real one alright. Never met one before, though, and I never plan to.”_

Robert tilts his head. “You’re not on friendly terms?”

It must be a bewildering thought. That some cryptids don’t get along.

_“Not enough for croquet. Our races used to compete for resources and territory all the time. There’s a lot of bad blood between us, and modernization hasn’t put a damper on that.”_

Robert nods slowly, takes all that in. I wonder vaguely if he’s picturing who would win in a knockdown, drag out, no holds barred brawl between eight feet of wolf and eight feet of ape. I try not to think about who the winner might be in that situation. According to my aunts, confrontations are rare and usually brief, but they always end in blood.

His expression lightens as something else comes to mind. “Mermaids?”

I smirk inwardly, my mind filling with thoughts of metallic _pings_ , clattering pebbles, and shadows half-imagined beneath rippling waves.

 _“Merfolk, yeah. Lots of different kinds of them.”_ I hold my hands apart to approximate sizes as I speak, _“They go from cute little octopus guys the size of a football to glowey, deep-sea eel monstrosities forty feet long. But it’s really the tropical ones you need to worry about. Pretty as they are, those tales of seafarers getting eaten didn’t come from nothing.”_

He looks positively captivated by that. “There aren’t . . . any around here, are there?”

I cock my head at him, drop my hands. _“Why?”_

Color floods into his face, and Robert turns sharply forward. “Nuthin’, just . . . was out the other night with a friend. Thought somethin’ weird happened at the pier.”

My insides twirl a little. I want to ask. Goddammit, I want to ask so badly.

 _“Like what?”_ Bad idea, bad idea, bad idea.

He rubs the back of his neck, pointedly refusing to look directly at me. “Do . . . merfolk have a sense of humor?”

_You bet your rugged ass they do. “Some of them.”_

Robert glances at me from the corner of his eye, drops his hand, and looks awkwardly at the grass. “Enough to play matchmaker?”

My guts clench into solid granite, and I sit up straight. Even without intimate knowledge of what he’s talking about, a blind person might see how uncomfortable this topic makes him. I want to know. Listening to the night recounted from his perspective would floor me, I know. I wonder what insights he would grant a varúlfur. If he would trust a hulking wolf with his confidences the same way said wolf has done for him. But his body language is tense, face drawn up tight as he waits to be bombarded with questions, and I think on all the nights he must have wanted to hurdle questions at me but let the night pass in silence out of respect.

I grant him the same courtesy.

 _“I wouldn’t put it past them,”_ I reply simply. _“Stirring things up for other races is sort of their favorite pastime. More so than the fae.”_ And my being varúlfur just makes it all the more funny to them.

It takes a moment for it to come back, but Robert does perk a little and let his breath out his nose, tension evaporating with it. “No aliens, though?”

I chuckle, and the shift back towards lighthearted is a welcome one. Anymore talk of mermaids playing Cupid and I’ll need Joseph’s knot guide to untangle my stomach. _“Not that I’ve personally seen; although, the history channel makes some interesting cases about abduction. And some sci-fi authors come up with the neatest theories.”_

“What about. . . .” Robert trails off here. Whatever word he’s looking for, it seems to be eluding him. “Wendigos?”

My hackles stiffen into a black and gray spiked mountain. Without thinking, I scan the forest around us with rapid, darting eyes, ears tuned high towards the surrounding trees. Several moments of tense, absolute quiet pass. A quiet that remains forever broken by the uninterruptable chorus of crickets and the mute flashes of fireflies and not-fireflies at the base of the hill. Beyond that, nothing pertinent stands out.

I let my breath out in a long exhale, releasing the boulder of tension that had settled on my shoulders, and am surprised by how much air I was holding in.

Robert is disturbed by my reaction, mirroring my unease with his own search of the darkened trees.

 _“You shouldn’t say their name out loud,”_ I tell him sternly.

“They do exist?” He’s taken aback by it, as all who think they are a myth should be.

_“They do, and you **don’t** want to draw their attention by talking about them. It’s never a good idea to call some things by name. It invokes them. Compels them to come to where they’re called. Few things are ever happy to be invoked.”_

Mixed confusion and astoundment drift into his scent and features. “But aren’t they an Algonquin legend? Like a bad spirit? Algonquin tribal land is hundreds of miles from here.”

I shake my head. _“Doesn’t matter. Names have **power** , Robert. All legends may start somewhere, but birds and butterflies aren't the only creatures that migrate.”_

That shuts him up. His face pales a shade and looks away from me. Down the hill towards the congregation of lights still dancing about joyfully. Every now and again a light will hover, blink a complex pattern, and another light will blink back. Gossipers that they are, fairy language isn’t tough to decipher. Not only do they know we’re here, they’re talking about us. The varúlfur and his human interest have been the talk of the woods since I ran that bear off.

Not that Robert would be able to recognize any of it. From here, they just look like bugs.

Thoughts pass as much through Robert’s eyes and scent as through his mind.

He asks slowly, “Does your species have a name, ghost?”

Here is the part where I exercise my right not to answer.

“Right,” he mutters, “dumb question.”

The resulting silence is painfully awkward, yet Betsy has managed to find a peaceful spot a few feet down the slope to curl up into a doggy donut and catch some z’s. Robert doesn’t ask any more questions for a long time. Rather, he takes his knife and little wooden whale back up and continues working the small block in careful sweeps.

“Thought I saw one when I was a boy.”

And now it’s my turn to gawk.

 _“Are you serious?”_ I gape.

Robert nods stoically, and launches into his tale with a far-off look. “I was a kid then, livin’ it up in the northern wild. Was tougher, soft but indestructible in that way kids are. So my old man takes me into the deep wood for a week of just us and untamed wilderness, nothing but a block of flint, one knife, and the clothes on our backs to keep us alive. He started hearing it on the second night but kept it from me—tryin’a spare me from knowing what was out there, I guess.

“It was the third night before I started hearing it, too. Soft at first; thought it was the wind and went back to sleep. Next night I thought it was my old man telling me to come outside the shelter, but there was somethin’ wrong about the way he was speaking. Like talkin’ through a wall of cotton; it was him but all thick and distorted. And there was my old man lyin’ next to me with his voice comin’ from the piercing dark. I was terrified, but I couldn’t help it, I had to see what was out there that sounded like my dad. So I took a peek, and I regret it to this day.”

He is quiet for a moment, shaving a couple more slices from the block as I watch him intently. Waiting for him to go on. Trying to figure out if I’m being dragged along or if stories with the most truth to them really are the hardest to believe.

 _"What did it look like?"_ I ask under my breath, full to the brim with morbid curiosity. I already know the answer, but I want to hear it regardless.

“Like a nightmare,” he whispers, staring hard at the wood with eyes drawn tight. “Like a person if someone who didn’t know what a person looked like tried to draw one. Long neck, arms to the ground, pale as ice, and a head like nothing I ever saw before. It was standing about twenty feet from the shelter, just barely lit by the campfire. It had . . . _antlers_.”

My heart stammers in my stomach. Some skeptical, logical part of my brain knows this is surely another tall tale cooked up to impress or terrify me, but there is another part that wonders. Considers how it could be true. Wonders what Robert Small truly saw and lived to speak of.

“It was thin, starving even. It looked right at me, and I knew I was gonna die.”

_“What happened?”_

“I screamed. Ain’t proud of that, but I was a kid—not much else a kid can do. So I scream, and my old man comes out with his sidearm and lands two shots dead-on in this thing’s chest. Saw the rounds hit, heard ‘em. Only it doesn’t flinch. Just turns and takes off into the wood. We held up until first light, packed our shit, and got the hell out of dodge.”

All I can do for a moment is stare at him. Thoughts and images race through me. Memories of weird sounds on camping trips with Craig as reckless college kids. Sounds even my keen ears couldn’t place and left me praying the mere fact of what I was would be enough to keep us alive until daybreak, all while Craig practiced handstands in the tent like nothing was wrong. Normally, being what I am is enough to ensure safe passage most anywhere, but I know it now just as well as I knew it then: I am not the most dangerous thing out there.

I think on this while staring numbly at Robert for a long moment, quiet and contemplative as he shaves thin strips of pale wood from the top of the sculpture’s head.

Then context clues fit into place one at a time, and I smirk. _“Oh, you’re good.”_

It’s subtle, gone in a flash, but the corner of Robert’s mouth twitches. “Am I?”

 _“Exceptionally.”_ I lean in close, a rumble in my chest, and am treated to the sight of a microscopic shiver crawl up his spine and end with goose bumps broken out on his neck. _“Do you know what gave you away?”_

Robert is looking at me, but his eyes are fixated on my maw. Under his breath, “What, ghost?”

White fangs can be glimpsed behind lips that curve as purrs whisper past them. _“You would never go into the woods again if you truly knew what was out there.”_

“You’re out here.”

_“But I’m not the baddest kid on the block.”_

Yet Robert never leans away from me. Dark eyes drift, seeing all that the unhindered moonlight is willing to show him. I realize it then, that this must be one of the clearest times he’s ever seen me. How moonlight is thin but glints silver on black fur, patches of gray turned white. Maybe there is eye shine, but it isn’t as chilling. Or maybe he doesn’t see the eye shine at all. Maybe all he sees are wolf eyes smoldering.

_Eyes like burning amber._

_Fuckin’ incredible._

Only, this time, they’re not his words. Not spoken in his voice. This time they’re mine, because in the moonlight I’m seeing him, too. Because here, like this, dark eyes are flecked with thousands of tiny lights. White stars, distant yellow lamplight, and fiery green specks. All flicker and shine in eyes that dart back and forth between mine, unable to settle on just one. The heat that mingles somewhere in-between us and that the breeze can’t quite chase away; thoughts of a chest flush with mine and fingers buried into the backs of each other’s shirts. Heat that bleeds through fur thick enough to stave off the swipe of an enraged bear and leather designed for comfort in a frigid gale.

Smells of grass, oak wood, pine, wild flowers. Distant asphalt, car smells. Fur, animal musk, Betsy’s groomer’s shampoo. Greenwood, deadwood, cool moist air. Sounds of trees gently swaying, branches that creak as they rub together.

Smoke, leather, lilacs, and earth. I could bury my nose up to my ears in it and still not get enough.

Scents like everything good.

The spell breaks with a blink, and I turn swiftly away, lean back to where I started.

Robert sways just a little where he sits, recovers after some slow breathing, and in the corner of my eye I see the edge of his mouth raised. No less weary than I, Robert shakes his head and shucks the blade of his knife along the edge of the whale’s body.

“Hey, you know the saying,” he says, “there’s always something big— _FUCK_!”

Betsy and I jump at the same time. Robert jerks his hands towards himself, knife and sculpture rustling where they fall in the grass. The sharp smells of iron and pain flood my nostrils and open a wide path to my pallet, lungs, and brain. A hundred things spin through me from the first warm splash of rabbit blood that painted puppy teeth to blaring truck horns, high beams, and the cramp in my hand to an identical look of pain when Robert asks me on the drive home late at night, _Do you ever wish you were a better father?_

All of it is swiftly replaced by the blaring flash of instinct to: _help my friend._

I tear up the hill on all fours without a second thought. The truck rocks violently when I bodily collide with the tailgate, don’t see the first aid kit anywhere, rifle through the hard plastic chest of an old cooler, and come up with an unopened bottle of natural spring water. Before rushing back, I glimpse a tall plant with a familiarly shaped shock of leaves, break it off at the stem, and race back down the hill.

Robert already has the hand bound with a clean, black paisley bandana, and Betsy is worrying at his side with one paw up on his leg. He gives her a reassuring pat on the head while I crouch next to them.

 _“Let me see,”_ I tell him.

He gets one look at the bottled water, does a double-take, gawks at me, then at the harvested weed I have in the other hand, and affronts me with an incredulous look.

“Nuh, uh. No. You babied me once already. Ain’t doin’ that again,” he asserts.

I don’t glare, don’t push, but let it come through in every ounce of body language I can muster and that he can recognize: _“Please, Robert.”_

Whether it’s the tone of voice, the sideways droop of my ears, tilted head, or something in the eyes, Robert glances away, sighs, and turns enough that he can provide the hand in question.

With immense care, I cradle his wrist, push up his sleeves, unwind the bandana, and use it and the water to gingerly clean away what I can. Overall, Robert is unbothered by the whole thing. The cut isn’t serious. About an inch long and not very deep. It starts just under the heel of his thumb and extends to just past the lowest knuckle. It bleeds a lot, but that’s thanks to a fairly substantial blood vessel.

I hum thoughtfully, tell him to give me a second, and clean off my hands before plucking several leaves off the plant stem and mash them into a pungent, gooey green paste. Betsy sniffs at it curiously, snorts, sneezes, and proceeds to rub her face in the grass. I rinse off his hand again, blot it dry, but before I can apply it, Robert pulls back.

“What is that stuff?” he asks, wrinkling his nose at it.

What smells rank to him is searingly godawful to me.

 _“Old fae remedy,”_ I explain, mostly the truth. _“Helps blood clot and encourages healing. Smells like ripe ass, though.”_

“You ain’t lyin’.”

_“It’s going to burn a little.”_

He gives his hand back, surprisingly without protest, and I steady it on my knee while pressing a generous amount of putrid green goop into and around the cut. Robert hisses sharply, and I apologize because that little burn is more of a “stings like a bastard.” He glares at me.

The job takes no time at all. Wherever the plant matter is applied, blood stops leaking almost immediately. The burn the plant leaves quickly overpowers the sting of the cut itself, but after a moment even that begins to die down as the chemicals burn themselves out. Only a cool numbness is left behind. Robert flexes his hand carefully, and I gingerly push down what the movement dislodged. He seems impressed.

I bind it back up with the bandana as a safeguard but don’t let go of his hand right away. Curiosity and the nearness get the better of me. The many pale nicks along his hand draw my attention more than I want to look away. When Robert doesn’t immediately withdraw, I glance into his face. He is not easy to read, expression tight but not due to any kind of pain. He merely nods at the unasked question, and with great delicacy I ease the hand closer for inspection.

Whittling accidents or not, these are not the hands of someone who has lived an easy life. Their story is unknown to me, but its trials I can glimpse in small, pale stripes on the edges of knuckles and finger pads, the meaty side of his palm, and one that just skirts the edge of his tattoo. Another mystery I’ve wanted to solve but never asked for fear of being unable to tell placid truth from glamorous lie.

I follow the line of one scar with the smooth side of a claw and gingerly turn his hand over. Side by side, his look almost diminutive. Skin a rich ombre color accentuated by moonlight. Scars that look miniscule next to my own long, grayish-white stripe.

Robert’s fingertips find it, then. He follows the shape of it with a slow sweep of his thumb; it tickles a little, makes my claws twitch. His brow creases with unspoken apology. The impulse to let go is there, but it’s easily ignored.

 _“This happens to you often,”_ I say. It’s not a question. The barest observance of fact.

Robert shrugs. “I’m used to it. Knives have a mind of their own sometimes, and you gotta respect that you’re gonna get bit. You might not have noticed, but I’m what humans call ‘danger prone.’”

He says it with a point of pride, like it’s something to brag about because on some level maybe it is. Because it’s something we have in common and has made his skin a complex tapestry filled to the brim with potential comedic gold. I can hardly imagine the hundreds of tails he’s spun around each and every one. Which ones he received in a knife fight with drug cartel, defending himself from pissed off marks as a lone grifter, or fighting for his life in some cryptid related, deep woods ambush scenario.

He flexes what fingers won’t interfere with my binding, showing off the minute differences in how the skin around his scars puckers as opposed to on the unmarked areas.

I huff, smiling in the corner of my mouth. _“Oh, believe me, I’ve noticed. You must be one of the most danger prone humans I’ve ever met. Seriously: trucks, teenagers, **bears**. What doesn’t have it out for you?”_

Robert laughs so hard his shoulders quake. “Hey, a little bit of danger is good for you! Keeps the heart healthy.”

I chuckle. _“Then your heart must be very healthy. ‘Danger’ should be your middle name, then, not my—”_

I stop short as my heart stops, somersaults, flips up high, and pile drives itself into a panicked shot of adrenaline.

My eyes snap up just as Robert whips his head around, eyes blown wide in their sockets. 

I freeze. He gapes.

He does it before I can react.

Robert locks eyes with my hand. At the palm lit by a waning but vibrant moon. Callous black pads divided down their center by the whitish-gray streak. A knife wound that goes all the way through the other side and ends with a slight hook towards the heel.

Gears grind as they stutter and stop, then snap sharply into place and kick a machine to roaring life.

“Hedger my ass,” Robert abruptly declares.

Dark brown eyes pierce into petrified amber.

_Run._

It’s the only thought that flares up blindingly behind my eyes. The only instinct.

I obey.

 _Run,_ it tells me.

I obey.

Run as fast as you can and don’t stop, it screams.

Get Amanda.

It’s time to go.

Somewhere behind me, I don’t know how far back, Robert calls for me to stop. Sound of scuffling hands and feet as they stumble up the hill. Betsy barks. I don’t look back.

“Wait! Stop!” He calls. Uses my name. Maybe thinks it will compel me. 

It doesn’t. That’s the easiest part. 

The worst part? 

“John—! Ghost, stop!”

I want to obey _him_.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> **UNREPENTANT MANIACAL LAUGHTER** And now the fun begins!!
> 
> Imagining other cryptids is literally my favorite thing UGHHH
> 
> If you take anything at all from this fic please let it be bioluminescent fairies gossiping about werewolves, dinnertime at the Jersey Devils' house, nightmare-fuel gulper eel mermaids, and werewolf puppies who haven't grown into their paws yet. That's it, that will be my legacy.


	9. And the Band Played On while We Ordered a Round

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> As all the world comes crumbling down, a warm hand and gentle words provide an anchor to the storm. A place to root oneself and brace for what must be done next.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Quick note before you start: I live in Florida, and Hurricane Irma is slated to hit us tomorrow afternoon. I’m probably going to be without power for a few days (best case scenario) so next week’s update will likely be delayed. Provided I still have a fuckin house when this shit is over. Mothman, if you’re there, get me the hell outta this godforsaken state. 
> 
> Thank you all for being such awesome, wonderful, and supportive fans of this fic! I love you all to absolute pieces!
> 
> Click [here](http://crescentmoondemon.tumblr.com/post/165566760598#notes) for John’s canon appearance.
> 
> Link to the [Terminology Master Post](http://crescentmoondemon.tumblr.com/post/165422480878#notes).

Amanda has the note in her hand when she comes into the kitchen.

I must look a sight. I haven’t slept. Not a wink. I’ve been pulling at my hair all night, knocking my head into things. The house is locked down tighter than Fort Knox with every door locked and every curtain drawn. Usually curtains are open to let the morning sun in; she notices. I’ve stress-eaten almost the entire tub of vanilla ice cream and am currently waiting for my second pot of coffee to finish brewing so I can annihilate that, too.

“Mornin’, Pops,” she says carefully, slowly taking a seat at the counter across from me like any sudden movements might cause me to pop out of my skin. 

I force a smile. It’s rough, strained. My eyes must be red, like I’ve been crying because I have. If I look half as bad as I feel she must think I started binge eating as soon as I got home.

“Good morning, sweetie,” I say, pushing myself up off the counter enough to stretch my back out. “You read my note?”

She nods once, shallow. “Yeah. Not that I mind having permission to skip school, but what’s this about?” Her eyebrows are caught somewhere between raised and furrowed. It’s a cute look, but it’s a worried one. Deeply worried. “Did something . . . happen?”

She says it so carefully, like navigating a minefield. The kind of anxiety that doesn’t deserve to weigh on the shoulders of a teenager with problems of her own, let alone those her father is going to add to.

I sigh like I’m trying to push a cyclone out of my chest and slump back to the countertop. It’s still warm from where I’ve been fanned out on it the past half hour, dusted with hidden crumbs, but it’s cooler than my skin and it feels nice.

“Yeah, something did happen last night,” I say. Without looking, I pull the tub of ice cream to my side, mostly reduced to chalky off-white soup, and slide it in front of her. “I know vanilla isn’t your favorite, but you deserve ice cream for breakfast.”

“ _I_ deserve it?” she asks, peering over the rim of the tub at me. Cream, yes, but there isn’t much left by way of ice. “Dad, come on, you’re starting to scare me.”

Okay, no more shtick. I’m worrying my daughter.

Peeling myself off the countertop, I wipe a few crumbs off the side of my face, card my hair back, and fix her with a long look.

“I ran into Robert last night.”

Her eyes go a modicum wider, but she hangs on to her optimism, bless her. “And?”

I say nothing. Working my jaw anxiously, I shut my eyes tight and hold up my hand.

She stares at it for a long moment, the color slowly draining from her face.

“He . . . ?” Amanda starts to say, doesn’t finish.

I nod.

Amanda looks into the tub of ice cream, staring at it hard, teeth clenched so I can see the muscles over her temples flex, and scoots the soggy tub away from either of us.

I sink back onto the counter like a boneless heap of slug dad, unable to hold myself up even as my heart goes through caffeine, sugar, and anxiety palpitations. Can’t bring myself to look her in the eye. Ears and tail figuratively tucked, but only just so.

“What are . . . you going to do?” she cautiously asks.

 _You,_ she says. Not us. Not we.

In my bedroom, my go bag is on the floor beside my desk. It’s an innocuous thing usually kept under the bed: a faded blue duffel bag far older than it looks. In it are three changes of clothes, shoes, a map, emergency blanket, jacket, external hard drive I back up weekly, a thousand in cash, spare keys, pocket knife, water purifier, basic first aid and toiletries, snack bars, and some valuables not too sentimental to pawn. For twenty years, I’ve only ever touched it to move it. Amanda has one, too. It’s green and yellow and kept hanging on a hook in the back of the hall closet; it contains all the same items, but in place of cash and valuables is has three disposable cameras and a photo album of polaroids no one outside our family knows exists.

Putting both bags side by side this morning was one of the most painful things I’ve had to do since I stood beside a long box in a black suit and tie.

“Park Ranger, I keep telling myself.” Elbows on the countertop, I knit my fingers together against my brow, eyes squeezed shut. “Park Ranger, but. . . . I don’t know, panda. . . .”

I’ve kept that bag since I was six years old. Something my father made us all have for as long as I can remember. When I was little I used to think of it as my camping bag, but when I tried to bring it on a trip once he got mad, told me to put it back with his. Part of New Year’s resolutions always involved updating what was inside. The first time I remember it being used I was nine. Mom took me out of school one day; her eyes were red and she had a haunted look despite her calm demeanor. Our go bags were the only things in the back seat. She wouldn’t tell me what happened, only that dad would meet us in the morning. That night we drove longer than I thought the world was wide around, only stopping for gas. I left behind two best friends and my first crush, never saw them or that town again.

The second time I was twelve years old. I remember going hunting with my parents, waiting dutifully to flush out our prey. Commotion and an unsettling scent; afraid to be mistaken as a bear, I changed back to human. After that things get fuzzy. All the world is dark, my body on fire, and I wake up four days later ice cold and sweating in the Louisiana heat. Around me: a family of kodril, a witch old enough to be my great-grandmother, a rougarou who I don’t recognize, my parents who look like they haven’t slept in weeks, and our go bags.

Today is the first time I’ve touched Amanda’s go bag since we updated it last.

It’s dusty, strap seams fraying just a little. The photo album sits on top of everything else, the only thing routinely touched.

It’s not heavy, but it really is.

I smile ruefully, utterly devoid of humor. “Feels like we’ve only just finished unpacking, and you’re so close to moving out. Since day one I thought Maple Bay would be the perfect spot to sink in my old man roots. You have friends; I do, too. Heck, even Craig is here. If we leave now, I’ll have to use my savings on another house and that includes your college fund and you got into one of the best art colleges in the country and I’m so proud of you but I can’t do that to you and I—”

I could go on and on. Only stop when slight hands cup my face, forcing mine to fall away.

When I look at her, I expect a little girl ten years younger, frizzy haired, missing a front tooth, and grinning at me so widely there’s no way anything in the world could be wrong. In a lot of ways, she’s still that little girl. All grown up, hair still messy but contained in a high ponytail and that yellow ribbon Alex bought her at the mall when her scrunchy broke. She’s got all her teeth—her adult teeth—and she’s a woman now and maybe she doesn’t need me as much as she used to but she’s still my baby girl.

“Dad,” she says in a voice that is more grown up than I can handle, and the corners of my eyes begin to mist over, “as the other player in this crazy shindig, I demand my piece be heard.”

I nod tentatively.

“Play it by ear, yeah?”

My eyes go wide, start to protest a point that teeters suspiciously close to “cool your jets, Pops,” but Amanda shakes her head at me.

She goes on, “Don’t make this about my comfort. Don’t make this about _my_ safety only. This is about your safety, too. And I don’t just mean the physical kind. I mean the mental and emotional kind, too. College can wait, we can always get a new house, and I can make new friends. All of that, sure, but I know what that’d do to you. Was kinda planning on doing all that regardless of this whole Robert debacle. But dad, listen to me, your safety matters, too, and uprooting everything now doesn’t guarantee anything but us being stressed out, lonely, and miserable for the next six months.

“This is Maple Bay we’re talking about. You don’t get more sleepy, seaside, vanilla-kosher than here. There are honest to god nymphs living in the trees; when was the last time you heard of nymphs living anywhere outside the deep forest? I mean have you _seen_ how many hot single dads live here? This place is practically paradise for you, and I’ll be damned before I see you give it up because your _friend_ found out how hairy you actually are!”

“Panda. . . .”

Don’t cry. Oh my god, don’t cry.

She smiles gently, shakes her head at me. “Don’t ‘panda’ me, daddio. This is serious business. This is powdered sugar meets rainbow sprinkles on Bavarian-cream-filled kind of serious.”

“You take your donuts very seriously.”

“Darn right, I do. Now, you tell me, Pops. What’s your game plan _really_?”

Grounding myself with the help of warm hands—since when could her fingertips reach my ears?—I shut my eyes and breathe, shakily, until I can blink the tears back and they stay where they are. Her arms are longer than I remember them being, because now they can reach across the counter and wrap around me and hold on tight. Breath shudders through me. I hiccup. Sob once. Grip the back of her green bomber jacket, and she lets me cry for as long as I need to.

When I’m ready, she loosens her hold enough that I can lean back.

What’s my game plan? To disassemble my go bag and just . . . put it all away where it belongs.

“For now, I . . . I want to play it by ear,” I admit. Because this town feels more like home than I’ve felt since Alex passed, and that’s something. “Robert kept his promise so far. He knows you, knows me. Knows what’s at stake for us. He’s . . . we’re friends. Still. I think. God, I hope. . . . Maybe if he understands. . . .”

Amanda nods gently. “Do you think so?”

My jaw tightens. “God, I hope so.”

* * *

She braids my mane when I need cheering up. It gives us both something else to think about. The rhythmic motions under and over. Long locks of fur being twisted into braids here and there, and the mindless conversation it leads us through is nice in its own way. Mostly, Amanda talks about school as she sits on the couch, legs crossed beneath her, the backs of my shoulders against her knees.

I lose count of how many braids she gives me somewhere around the part where Emma R. dared Lucien and Ernest twenty-bucks to kiss. Apparently, that day Emma R. went home forty bucks and a bottle of mouth wash poorer.

I’ve finally begun to really relax. Letting the couch accept my weight while my tail flicks up and down to the side of me.

Until a _ding_ from my computer almost sends me sprawling in cardiac arrest, and I come up human. 

Amanda would have stayed home from school for the asking. Right now, I really need the company, and I’ve never been so grateful for the supportive presence of my daughter when I check my computer and see a flurry of messages coming in from Dadbook.

> _Robert: hey_  
>  _Robert: john_  
>  _Robert: wyd_  
>  _Robert: hey_  
>  _Robert: you on?_

Elbows on the desk, I cradle my head in my hands and do my best impression of a dad who is in no way, shape, or form, teetering on the cusp of emotional, physical, and psychological collapse.

I look to my daughter, helpless, pleading.

> _Robert: you still wanna talk_

A thick scruff-lined neck pinned to steel red as much from rust as paint by claws bigger than any of his knives. Headlights had streaked by, stopped me from crossing, from escaping, gave him time to catch up, to grab my arm. How my paw flexes when his throat does, a hard swallow rolling its way down. Anxiety and awe curved lips that smell of smoke but not alcohol. Sweat, leather, tobacco, and that one something underneath and blanketing it all. The scent of _him_ : like old cologne, birch, and lilacs. Like weather-packed earth at twilight, cooling slow but still hot from the day. Brittle and dry, it crumbles in the hand; it clings, it follows. It’s the grit beneath my claws, the grinding in my teeth. It lingers, it overstays its welcome, yet I turn my nose to it with glee while my heart pounds with exhilaration, press my paws to its unyielding surface, and let it fill me with the day.

My claws that loosen, release him. Two hearts still hammer, only one fighting back desperate whines. When I step away, he rubs his neck, coughs, and all I can think about is the pleading in his eyes. _“We need to talk,”_ I say.

And the only thought pounding drumbeats in my head right now is if he meant to leave out the question mark.

“Your move, daddio.” Amanda cheers me on, leaning with arms folded over the back of my computer chair. She’s a gem. “What’ll it be?”

“Something that involves alcohol, probably. No, hopefully. Lots of it. Strong. God, I need a hangover. Help me feel alive. Remind me if all of this is real.”

> _Robert: john?_

“Are you going to reply to him?”

I almost do. Feels kind of rude to leave a guy hanging. But. . . .

I shove away from the desk. “He can sweat it out for a bit. Right now, I need a few more hours to feel like everything is fine. And I’m gonna take my daughter to the mall on a school day for the greasiest nachos she can stomach and the cheesiest schlock of a horror movie this side of Timbuktu.”

We look at each other, and Amanda is smiling. It’s not crazy big. Not the ear-to-ear maniacal grin a father might expect from a teenager on a parentally condoned hooky day, but for the moment it alleviates my fears and I can genuinely think things are going to be okay.

Amanda squeezes my shoulder. When did she get to be so grown up?

“Everything _is_ fine, dad. We’re gonna be okay.”

For now, I allow myself to believe her.

* * *

I wait for Amanda to be asleep before braving the trip back to my computer. No new messages since the last ones he sent. My breath exits stage right, hissing its way out between my teeth, and I pop my knuckles just to get some of the tension out of my body.

Reminding myself to inhale, I type.

> _John: Yeah, I do._

I’m about to head for the kitchen and get the coffee pot brewing when a reply dings suddenly back.

> _Robert: good_  
>  _Robert: meet me at jim n kims @ 10 pm_

My eyes narrow at the screen.

> _John: No._  
>  _John: My venue or bust._

The chat tells me he reads it immediately, but it takes about thirty seconds before the “Robert is typing . . .” scroll appears.

> _Robert: ok_

Oh god, I’ve committed. I realize it in a flash.

This is it. This is the end for me. I’m going to be found in an alleyway tomorrow morning with a silver plated butterfly knife in my heart, I just know it. Amanda will be forced to live with my parents, and Florida is such an awful place to live.

Okay, John, think. Don’t panic, just think. Yeah, because that works every single time. Someplace that doesn’t know us as well. Or at least me. Something tells me most bartenders in town know Robert on a first name basis. More than anything, I just don’t want to run into Mary. I make sure to include that much when I tell him the spot for the evening. I check the clock, tell him to meet me there in half an hour or I’m gone. If funny business is afoot, I have no intention of giving him adequate time to prepare.

Meeting set, Robert offers a short, affirmative _ok_ and no more messages are exchanged.

My hand drags its way down my face like a lead brick gliding into the abyssal Marianna Trench.

Half an hour, I said. Half an hour to decide if I’m really going through with this.

* * *

I don’t show up until the forty-four minute mark, and I don’t need to look around to find him.

He’s seated at the bar stool second from the door, leaning back with elbows propped on the counter, bottle of beer in one hand while sternly eyeballing a TV above a display of vintage scotch. A game is on, not The Game, but while he’s looking at it he is not watching, eyes distant like seeing through it, seeing something in his mind utterly unrelated to the bar scene. Glancing about, I find the bar mostly dead save for a few diehard gamers playing pool on a three-and-a-half legged billiard table clearly marked _Out of Order_. It’s a weeknight and nowhere near happy hour. You’d have to be dehydrated or desperate to be in a place and time like this.

I lick my lips and realize I’m both.

The door doesn’t jingle until it closes. My spine goes rigid, and Robert double-takes. Our eyes lock. For an instant, I think he might smile. Until my stomach wrests, and I look away before I can see it. _Don’t do that to me now,_ I plead.

I locate a small booth in the back and fall into it. Robert joins me, sliding into the adjacent bench with his bottle and a second unopened one. He slides it towards me, glass scraping as it drags along the table and leaves a wet streak of condensation; my hands bury in my pant legs just to give them something to do besides shake. His eyes aren’t on me. A small relief; I feel like I might be ready to explode, and I just picture myself throwing up with his burning gaze on me.

Robert sips idly from his bottle, eyes closed. I half expected him to be drinking whiskey tonight. Stars know I’d prefer that to beer right now. Whatever will get my heart to stop racing like this. Not that I’d be able to stomach anything at the moment. All I can do is hold onto my bottle, grateful for the grounding effects of the chill it exudes.

Robert starts us off.

“Was startin’ to think you weren’t coming,” he states gruffly, looking at the table, sparing me direct line of sight.

“Almost didn’t. Having the safety and wellbeing of your family put in jeopardy will do that to a guy.” I thumb the neck of the bottle until my palms are wet, lift it mechanically to my lips. A thought comes to mind; I hesitate the briefest instant as I consider it, then go for broke. “Also, I had to outrun the dogcatcher.” 

His hand shoots to his mouth with an unceremonious snort, bottle balanced precariously as he tries, and fails, to contain his sudden laugh. Against all odds, I smile, feel the tension peter out just the tiniest bit.

Wow, this is actually a really nice beer.

“And how’d that go?” Robert asks, the makings of a smirk playing at his mouth.

“I was faster. He was kinda chewy, though.”

He chuckles, but something in it makes it feel less genuine.

“So, you wanted to talk,” he says.

I nod, but I really don’t. Not truly. The silence ticks on for another beat as the hum of giddy life settles in around us. Glasses clink behind the bar, people laugh, billiard balls clack, someone cusses, another calls at the bartender who pointedly ignores the hail until her appropriate name is used. Robert’s eyes are on me, now—mine on the table—but there’s no impatience in it. No heat or weight. Anticipation, curiosity, maybe a little confusion when I let the quiet stretch out over several beats too long. Until a new song comes over the ancient PA system and I slowly let the air out of my lungs.

Just remember to breathe, I tell myself.

“Robert, I don’t know you very well, and I’m sure you realize how little you know me, but I need to know where your head is at. About all this. . . .”

The bottle is almost at his lips again when he pauses. He looks at me over the narrow edge, brown glass wet and shiny in the dim overhead light. He doesn’t lower it right away. Just looks at it, to me, to the bottle. Takes a swig then drops both arms to the tabletop.

“I hate small talk,” he says, directed as much to the countertop as to me, “and you don’t like being asked difficult questions. I get it. Now I’m the only asshole in town who understands _why_. I get that, too. I’d say we are both well and truly out of our comfort zones.”

“Oh, believe me, I am so far out of my comfort zone right now I might as well be in Tahiti. In fact, I could really go for some coconut rum and the company of man-eating mermaids.”

A thick black eyebrow shoots up, and for a second I see a glimmer there. But it’s tempered, and Robert frowns deeply. He opens his mouth to retort, catches himself, then leans back in his seat and closes his eyes. He breathes slowly through his nose.

“I’m serious, John.”

“So am I.”

He looks at me, but I look at the table. The instinct to avoid eye contact is there, and it isn’t a quiet one.

“I can’t make you do anything, John. Never have, never wanted to,” he mutters under his breath. So quiet it almost doesn’t reach me over the din of laughing and clacking. But it does, and his voice is so soft when he says it I’m afraid to look at him because I think I might see a stranger sitting in his place. “But I wanna understand some things first.”

 _“Fine.”_ The word comes out clipped, more exasperated than I realized I was feeling. I amend it with shoulders less squared and a calmer, more resigned, “I owe you that much. You . . . you’ve kept your promise.”

“Always intended to.”

“But you gotta understand, there are some things I can’t explain, Robert.”

“Can’t? Or won’t.” It’s not a question, or at least it’s not phrased like one.

My lips purse into a hard line, staring hard at the rich brown glass and the alcohol I desperately want battering my apprehension into nonexistence. Anything to get the thunder out of my ribcage. I take a long drink, squint when it burns the inside of my mouth.

“Both. It’s a bit of both,” I explain. “There’s a lot. . . . Somethings even I don’t know. Others. . . .”

“Have you ever killed someone?”

 _“No!”_ I look at him aghast. “I’ve never even been in the military.”

“Wasn’t talking about the military.”

“Neither am I.”

Robert nods.

“Have you ever attacked anyone like that?”

“Like wh—?” I start to ask, stop short, take a breath. Of course he wants to know this. It’s completely reasonable, I tell myself. This is his town, too. He’s as invested in its safety as I am for my daughter’s. “Only in self-defense, and never enough to cripple or maim. I’ve been shot at, chased on ATVs, once by a Cessna. Running is so much easier than fighting.”

At that, his eyebrow does quirk a bit higher. “Cessna, huh?”

I can’t resist. “Bigfoot’s croquet tournament got busted up by some angry leprechauns once. Turns out Ogopogo owed them money, and they thought they could get at her by taking me hostage.”

A grin pulls up the corner of his mouth, puckering one of his eyes. Man, that’s a good look for him. The light of the moon frames him so much better, but this isn’t half bad.

“So it was more of a model airplane,” he says, leaning forward to knit his hands together on the table.

I shrug. “Still had a mounted rifle.”

“I can’t believe you never killed anyone with claws like that. You’re fuckin’ huge.”

 _Fuckin’ incredible._ The words start a loop inside my head, but I swiftly bat them out of the air and focus on fighting off the heat that swells on the back of my neck to the tips of my ears.

“So a samurai carries his sword on him everywhere he goes,” I say. “He can cut a person in half with it. People fear him. That doesn’t mean he beheads a person in every town he visits.”

“No,” Robert agrees, gazing calmly at me, tone evening out into the level plain of a green, grassy savannah, “’cause he’s got himself a code.”

My throat tightens abruptly, and I avert my eyes. I can’t look at him. I can’t, I—

His eyes are soft. Black irises partially obscured by hanging lids, furrowed brows, messy bangs in serious need of a trim colored by the slow creeping of gray around the edges. It hits me: he looks exhausted. Eyes that are equal parts tired and wan as my own. I wonder, _Was he up all night, too?_

“Something like that,” I whisper, look down.

“You never hurt people.”

I shake my head. “Not if I can help it. Self-defense. Only ever in self-defense. Easier to just run.”

“Is it?”

“Yes?” I start to feel like I’m being led somewhere.

“And what about now. Are you going to run, now?”

There’s a beat, and I think I know what he’s referring to. Until I realize I don’t. Not initially.

My fingers clasp into the edge of the table. Amanda is the first thing that comes to mind. Her future and what moving or staying could mean for her. What it could do to her. Our go bags still lying side-by-side in my bedroom. Me and my safety are secondary. Always have been. Always will be, I know, regardless of her protests.

Of course I’ll run. I’ll always run if it means keeping my daughter safe. I’ll run as far as the land will take me and swim the rest of the way, sharks, sea monsters, and carnivorous mermaids be damned. The way Robert looks at me, I question if he knows that. Really knows it how I do. How strong the instinct to protect her is. If this pull is that way because of what I am, or if he can feel it, too. Just as strong. If he has family he would give up everything for, die for, probably even kill for.

Somewhere in that jumbled head of mine, I think maybe he does.

“Am I going to need to, Robert?” I ask. No tedium, nothing tentative to the words. No malice, but challenging. All the way through. I’ve spoken and he’ll answer. He’ll answer or there will be no more answers, period.

His promise plays in my head as if through a megaphone. _None of it is real._ He gave me his word. Me. Not the human façade, but the wolf. Me. The _real_ me.

The ghost.

He fixes me in a long stare, callous fingers moving absently over the glass collecting condensation and letting it thin out and dry on its own.

“If all goes according to plan,” he starts to say, doesn’t ask it. Not looking past me, or through me, or even at me, but _into_ me. Like he can see how my chest stammers until I remember to breathe again. Like he sees the outline of something bigger, hidden by and contained beneath skin that isn’t suited for my body, not really, and theorizing but not fully understanding how one could possibly withhold the other.

Robert sits back in his bench, swirls the bottle in a slow circle, puts one arm up over the backrest next to him, and speaks as if the mere thought of the accusation offends him. “No. You’ll never need to. Not from me.”

I sag gracelessly to the cool, damp countertop. “Thank fucking god. . . .”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry you can't really google what a kodril is; I made them up. Basically think an anthropomorphic alligator beefcake. (*whispers* They aren't really relevant right now, but we’ll be seeing them eventually, just not for a long fuckin time) Also, rougarou are essentially werewolves that live in the Louisiana bayou. More on that in the distant future, too.
> 
> Now if you'll excuse me, my alligator ass is going to scurry under a rock until the storm passes. Pray for my scaly behind!
> 
> News from the Parallel(mobile): Irma has passed and me, my family, and home are fine! Power is out and there's no telling how long it will stay that way, but we're good! Thank you all for your concern and support, I can't even express how grateful I am for all of you! *slobbery smooches all around*


	10. Tip Me Over and Pour Me a Drink

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The air is clear. Time to breathe.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> _**KICKS YOUR FUCKING DOOR DOWN** Guess who’s still alive, fuckers_
> 
> Oh my god, real talk tho? Thank you all who commented with their concerns about the Hurricane Irma thing. Everything is okay now and I’m so grateful to have such a kind and supportive bunch of awesome-sauces looking out for me! I love you guys! Uploads will probably still be slow because of the cleanup but things are back to normal for now!
> 
> Follow [this link](http://crescentmoondemon.tumblr.com/post/165566760598#notes) for John’s canon appearance.
> 
> Check out the new [Terminology Master Post](http://crescentmoondemon.tumblr.com/post/165422480878#notes) which features a comprehensive guide to pieces of language, cryptids, and other pertinent info. It will be updated as the story progresses, so check in regularly!

“Question,” he says.

I quip back without pause, savoring the warm, smooth finish of my second beer, “Answer.” 

The corner of his mouth twitches.

“Tch. Question _s_.” Emphasis on the plural.

Okay. 

I breathe, exhale to settle myself, square up, and put on my best ready face. I can do this, I tell myself. “Alright. Shoot, cowboy. Just nothing silver.”

Robert smirks.

“Chocolate?”

Simple enough.

“None toxic. I do occasionally binge on brownies and cupcakes at Joseph’s bake sales, you can ask Mary. Usually get a wicked stomach ache out of it, but that’s more from the sugar than the coco.”

“Raw meat, then.”

“Not as appealing as you’ve probably been brainwashed into thinking. I can’t get sick like a human does, but living prey can still hurt you when it fights back. I do prefer my steaks rare, but I get it from the grocery store just like you.” At his unconvinced eyebrow, I amend, “Okay, I prefer most meats rare. Okay, all meat, but still _cooked_. No parasites for this dad, thank you very much.”

He nods slow, swirling his bottle before knocking back what remains. “That bit about silver actually a thing?”

That gives me reason to pause. Here is usually a touchy subject, but. . . .

I show him my hand. The line down it marks the separation of my middle and ring fingers in a stripe so pale the pink flesh appears white, ending with a small hook towards the heel of my thumb. He stares at it for a long moment, swabbing his teeth with his tongue, and considers what he already knows and once thought he knew.

“Was that knife silver?” I ask.

“No.”

“It doesn’t have to be. Still cuts. Still _hurts_. What happens to _you_ when you’re shot or stabbed, regardless of what the metal is?”

Robert opens his mouth, but with a longer look at my hand he closes it again. Pauses, considers, then, “But silver can do worse?”

I hesitate, returning my hand to the cool safety of the bottle.

I like Robert. Like him a lot, but I don’t always feel like I know him. Not _know_ -know him, anyway. Not like Mary does, or probably Neil, the bartender at Jim and Kim’s, but despite his grandiose tales of cryptid hunting Amanda is right: he’s never struck me as the Hunter type. Ever since I learned they had a smell, I’ve always had a nose open for those types. And he’s kept his promises. Gave me his word and meant it—every step of the way.

_If keeping your secret is what it takes to repay you, then I’m willing to let my life stand as collateral._

But is that all this is? Repaying a debt?

Am I a debt collector or his friend?

“Hurts more. _A lot_ more,” I confess after lengthy deliberation. I catch myself fidgeting, tearing bits off the corner of my napkin. My discomfort must be more obvious than I thought if the deeper crease of his forehead is anything to go by. The way the edges of his eyes soften, maybe he regrets asking. This is sensitive information. “When you stabbed me, it was healed by morning, but silver? Injuries don’t heal as easy. Takes days, weeks. They get blistery, burned, infected. But pump one of us full of enough lead and that’d work just as well. We’re not immortal, just tougher than the average wolf.”

Robert’s eyebrows shoot up, back visibly straightening.

“’We?’” he repeats. My shoulders immediately stiffen; his assumptions must jump suddenly to Amanda and if my daughter has let slip anymore secrets that I haven’t. “So there really are more . . . of what you are?”

He says it so carefully, glances to the bustling billiard table where the nearest patrons are well out of earshot and too engaged in their own racket to care about us, but I can tell the word is there. The assumptions, the wondering. He wants to say it, and I’ve never been so grateful for the modicum of restraint that keeps him from it. People always jump to the words. Alex did at first, until he found out how uncomfortable they made me and never said them again. Amanda still says them from time to time when she’s excited, but she always feels bad about it later. Sometimes the terms are different—dogman, wolfman, werewolf, lycanthrope—depending on where you are or who’s talking, but the translation is always the same:

_Monster._

“I, uh. . . .” I swallow past a lump in my throat. 

As a server makes her way by with a tray, I order us another round. She comes back with two bottles, and I knock back half of my beer just to batter the reluctance out of my nerves, wincing through the burn it leaves in my mouth and throat, but Robert says nothing.

This is not easy territory to tread through. None of it is. All night I’ve been uncomfortable, more than ghost-me ever was talking about other cryptids, and he has to see that, feel it in the tension bleeding off my shoulders and how sometimes I can’t maintain eye contact with him. But all night he’s given me room to refuse. To not answer. This entire time the option has been there as it has every time he met the ghost. Asked his questions but never _pushed_.

It’s . . . appreciated.

“I came from somewhere, didn’t I? The clan thing was an exaggeration, but I do have parents,” I continue, staring into the shiny spots of moisture at the lip of my bottle. His attention never leaves me; maybe it drifts to my hands or the bottle, probably picturing them three times bigger, fuzzy, clawed, maybe the scrape of them at his throat, but he never looks away. “And no, it can’t be spread. That’s all Hollywood. It’s not a curse, and it sure as heck isn’t rabies or an STD. You’re either born one or you’re not. And yeah, my parents are like me. Same with my grandparents and the rest of my family. ‘Cept Alex. Alex was all human. If Amanda were my biological daughter, she’d probably be like me, too.”

“Probably?”

“You really want me to go into dominant and recessive genes? Here?” I ask flatly.

He seems to be debating it.

Thick halos of condensation ring the table beneath our bottles, the ones we’re working on and the empty ones yet to be cleared. The alcohol sits warm as a pilot light in my belly, radiating outward into the rest of me like heat into a room. It lingers in my shoulders, makes my head feel a little heavy on top of my neck, but otherwise isn’t enough to inhibit much. Fast healing, crazy immune system, and a body that is meant to be far bigger than it looks leads to high alcohol tolerance.

Not that I don’t feel anything. It’s hard not to with Robert Small sitting across from me.

He loosened his jacket at some point during the conversation—I can’t recall when—and it sits wider at the collar, almost off his shoulders, giving his neck room to breathe and showing off more red fabric and ombre skin on his chest and neck than is usual. I catch my eyes drifting that way more than once, seeing my own hands in my mind’s eye, three times bigger, black claws flexing, grazing his nape, white teeth glistening, wide tongue laving his tumultuous pulse—

Robert finally settles on, “I asked, didn’t I?”

That he did.

I tug the back of my shirt, sending a wash of cool air down my spine. _Down, boy._ “Not all people with parents like me are like me. Most are, but some are born human. Just human. No special powers or differences, save for maybe they’re not as worried about bears when they go on family camping trips.”

His head tilts just slightly to one side. “How can that be?”

I shrug. “We can look human, so maybe we’re part human, I dunno. How is the Loch Ness Monster able to reproduce asexually? Our history—” I stop briefly, tap my finger on the counter as I lasso my thoughts into the correct order. “—it doesn’t go back very far. Most of it’s spotty, and it’s not like we’ve ever had our genome sequenced. Texts have always been unreliable, and prior to the 17th Century written documentation is almost nonexistent. That’s why I can’t answer everything. None of us can. We don’t really have a written record, and it’s not like every cryptid wants to share their secrets with everyone else. All we really know is you’re either born all human or all . . . _wolf_. There’s no in-between, and having one human parent doesn’t seem to affect the odds.”

Robert nods slowly, more questions circling around behind his eyes but is apparently satisfied, and when he takes another drink I think maybe he’s heard enough for now. But his voice comes again, solemn and smooth. “Full moon?”

“Uhh, no. We can change whenever we want. Wasn’t a full moon on most of the nights we met, remember? But the lighting is better, so it makes hunting easier. Better to be out at night since most people are asleep. Fewer people to see you, so it’s easier to cut loose.” Thick black eyebrows shoot up, and I grimace at the reason why. “Animals. We hunt _animals_ , not people. Deer and rabbits and stuff. I told you, I never hurt people.”

I’ve always been proud of that fact. Taken great strides—and a few pop shots from startled hunters—to ensure it stays true.

I didn’t mean to sound as indignant as it did coming out, but even without him having to say it the accusation was there. And it hurt. Badly. Thoughts of witch hunts and inquisitions race through my mind. The untold thousands of my kind killed by silver tipped arrows or burned alive at the stake. Tales of the _loup garou_ killings and the Beast of Bray Road. Because a wolf is just a beast, a threat to the flock and must be killed. But a varúlfur is an abomination, and that must be culled.

_There used to be so many of us,_ grandma told me and my cousins once. _We used to be unafraid of walking the roads as we are. We were respected. Never feared._

_What changed?_ a childish me asked.

_Us. Humanity._

_But why are they afraid of us? What happened?_

She shook her head sadly, beads clattering as they swayed amidst long, wizened gray fur. _No one knows, child. It was before my time._

“Look, I—” Robert starts but doesn’t finish. He frowns, then frowns harder when my glower doesn’t recede. He cards his fingers roughly through his hair, tugging in a way that can’t be comfortable, and scowls somewhere over my shoulder. “I didn’t mean—What I meant was—I— _Agh_!”

His lips pull back over tightly clenched teeth, and when I think he’s going to slam his hands on the table he doesn’t. Rather, he sags, breath leaving him in a sigh that seems to carry more weight than exists in his entire body. 

“I’m sorry,” Robert says placidly, exhales heavily, and a tension I didn’t realize I was holding subsides. “I shoulda known better. Far as I can see, you’re a damn good father, and it’s not like there have been any mysterious deaths or disappearances since you came around.”

I smile faintly. Raising a glass of water to my lips, my words have an echo, “Not in Maple Bay, anyway.”

He shoots me a look, and suddenly I’m fighting gravity to keep the water from coming back up my nose. I recover before disaster can strike, wincing through the sting, but there’s no anger or indignation in how he’s looking at me. If anything, Robert seems happy. Well, maybe _happy_ is being too generous. Content might be more fitting. I still snicker, grinning to the extent my eyes are nearly closed.

“Amanda, though. She knows, right?” he asks.

I nod, setting the glass down. “She’s not a dog person for nothing. Her father and I, we made sure to introduce her to it young. It’s not the sort of thing you spring on a teenager, y’know?”

Robert smirks. “Her teachers musta thought she had one hell of an imagination.”

“Actually, that was another thing she learned early. Amanda loved to brag about how cool her dads were when she was little, but the number one rule was always: don’t talk about Pops’ dog.” I half expect him to laugh at it, but he doesn’t. Just listens, thoughtful, quiet. “If all her friends thought she had a dog at the house but there’s no dog, no sign she _ever_ had a dog, when they come to visit it makes her look like a liar. And that’s just one scenario.”

“What’re the other scenarios?”

It comes out before I can stop it, tongue loosened by the oily slick wamrth in my belly: “The wrong kind of person gets suspicious, and then we have to leave.”

It hangs between us like a curtain, tension bleeding through my arms into the table as I absently rub my left shoulder. The thick ring of condensation my glass of water leaves on the table is cold, and had I not just dropped a bombshell on myself it might have even been refreshing. Robert just stares at me, forehead pursed but otherwise tough to read. He hasn’t had as much to drink as I have, I realize. Not nearly enough to slip up as badly.

“The people you talked about before,” he speaks slowly, answers to his own internal question. “The ones that know about you. The bad ones—”

I cut him off, no polite shred to it. No argument, don’t ask. “I don’t want to talk about it.”

He says nothing. If my bluntness offends him, he holds it in well enough.

Nothing is spoken between us for a long time, not even when he orders the next round and I think he could be trying to loosen my tongue, but his questions never start back up. Silence settles in alongside us. It’s louder, now. The after-work crowd is in, eager for the clock to turn over into happy hour, but the bustle never seems to reach our scenic little corner of the world. It’s the comfortable type of quiet. The kind Robert likes and that I’ve come to appreciate so much. It’s warm, enough I’d call it that even without a stomach full of liquid heat. The background din of the bar is inescapable, and while it lingers it never truly intrudes, not even when the servers start bustling trays of shots and cocktails and snacks.

The Game is playing; neither of us cares.

We drink. Robert runs his fingers through the condensation on the table, and somehow the glisten of moisture on his thumb transfixes me. The cut on his thumb is bound with clear steri strips, and through it I can see the making of a clean, healthy new scab.

“Wanna get outta here?” Robert asks.

I nod.

We pay for our drinks. A few steps outside the door, Robert stops and takes a cigarette from the pack in his jacket pocket. He offers me one, but I decline. Filter between his lips, he flicks the sparker a few times before it finally lights. He must feel me staring. Has to. Because the way the flame lights up his face in red leaves a tightness in my chest, some part of me waiting to see the yellow-green glimmer of mirrored eyes—predator eyes, _wolf_ eyes—gazing back at me, but he never so much as glances my way, and there is no reflection of light, never would have been. The lighter slides neatly back into his leather jacket, cherry blazing while he breathes deep, then exhales a cloud of musky-sweet smoke through both nostrils.

_Dammit—down, boy!_

Robert leans against the wall. It looks like a good idea, so I join him, a casual foot separating us. The concrete easily supports the weight of two broody men and their various yet staggeringly different and irrefutably related troubles.

To my surprise, he breaks the quiet first. “Thanks for tellin’ me.”

I nod, say nothing.

“I ain’t foolin’ you, John. You never wanted me to know, but you told me anyway. This can’t be easy for you.”

“Oh, it’s not. But. . . .” I trail off, sigh, contemplate my—and my daughter’s—precarious position in the social hierarchy of my town while rubbing the back of my neck. I always feel so unprotected without the armor of thick fur, keen senses, and more than 300 pounds of muscly heft between me and the rest of the world.

The pros and cons and the very real and possible consequences of the last twenty-four hours press in on me worse than that weight vest Craig had me try on our last workout.

My biggest and ever-present worry is the lingering doubt: can I really trust him with this? No matter the times he’s proven himself or given his word the worry refuses to leave me. Is it enough that he gave his word? What if I can’t trust him? What if he and Mary get sloshed and he tells her and she tells the town? Would anyone even believe them? That Maple Bay’s newest bachelor is, what, a werewolf?

And what if . . . what if I _can_ trust him? What then? Does life go on like normal? Like everything is fine and he didn’t pull a knife on a holy-lord-honest-to-goodness-werewolf at the city overlook? Or sit with one by a burbling stream and a snapping fire? On the side of a quiet hill lit by moonlight and fireflies?

I exhale harder than is probably necessary and drop my arm back to my side. “I dunno. Honestly? It feels kinda good to talk about it. Deepest darkest secrets and all that. You know?”

Robert nods. “Yeah. Deepest darkest secrets.”

The walk back to the cul-de-sac is filled by that same silence, only occasionally interrupted by the faint sizzle of heat when Robert pulls a drag from his cigarette, a sound so soft he can probably only hear it because it’s right there in his lips and me thanks to sharpened hearing. It’s spring, so late it’s early, and the streets are empty save for a few straggling bar hoppers. No one talks to us, no one knows us. No one really even cares enough to acknowledge we exist, and I’m glad for it.

We walk; Robert smokes.

We’re almost to the cul-de-sac when his chuckle disrupts the cherished silence.

“What?” I ask, gazing curious at his sudden amusement.

His attention remains fixed ahead of us. We walk at the same pace, never needing to speed up or slow down to match the other, never need to separate to dodge sidewalk traffic or obstacles. We’re the only ones out.

“Your first day in Maple Bay. We met at the bar. Had some drinks.”

I remember. “We did.”

“Talkin’ about sports like normal folks. You were flirtin’ without even meaning to. All wide-eyed and fuzzy headed. Damn beastie that you are, couldn’t hold his whiskey.”

“And?” I ask, looking at him more fully now. Belly blazing with the distinct impression that this is meant to go somewhere.

His hands are in his pockets, red fabric straining a little more than usual against his chest. The lenses of his sunglasses glint whenever struck by the glow of passing streetlamps. Smoke that trails from the red-orange ember at the tip of his cigarette or spilling from the corners of his lips like fog on a cool autumn night. A hard jaw lined with stubble. Dark brown eyes that glint magnificently in the low light.

_“And,”_ Robert emphasizes, but he refrains from speech while scanning me from top to bottom, dim eyes drifting flagrantly about what he sees walking alongside him. “You came home with me.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter feels kinda short to me but I literally had no way of expanding it?
> 
> BUT YA'LL BEST GET HYPED PLZ BECAUSE NEXT CHAPTER THINGS GET FUCKIN _SEXYYY_ ***AIR HORN NOISES***


	11. Breathe

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> I asked for your word and you gave me your hand. I asked for a moment and you gave me the night.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Now, before any knickers get in a twist, I know that hooking up with Robert locks in the bad ending and makes him undatable, but bear with me here. I will not compromise my boys’ happy ending, but more than anything I loved the thought of the banter and a specific moment they could have in this chapter as a result.
> 
> Click [here](http://crescentmoondemon.tumblr.com/post/165566760598#notes) for John’s canon appearance and an updated profile.
> 
> Link to the [Terminology Master Post](http://crescentmoondemon.tumblr.com/post/165422480878#notes) which is updated regularly.

He says it so simply. With such casual ease I almost don’t know what he’s talking about.

Until I do.

Then everything lights up pink and hot, from the tips of my ears right down to my toes. A full body _blush_ , and it’s a rager. I gape at him with the most scandalized expression anyone in the history of anywhere has ever accomplished. Like it’s some kind of record because I’m pretty sure it is.

And Robert is _smiling_.

I frantically comb my frazzled mind for a retort because you don’t just say that after the night we’ve had and not expect one. I almost don’t find one. Because I can’t think suddenly with the memory racing jagged, stumbly circles through my head. Memory of a dim bedroom, roving hands, warm lips on flushed skin, and the promise that _I don’t kiss and tell, John_.

“Yes, well, you didn’t _know_ back then, so you can’t exactly cross ‘bang the cryptid’ off your bucket list just yet,” I defend, looking in the polar opposite direction apparently the only way to hide my blush.

“Oh, it counts alright.”

For some reason I envision those dumb Dadbook emojis flying past him, but all I can picture are hearts and eggplants.

“I took you _home_ with me, and you stayed ‘til mornin’.”

Everything goes a few shades redder, hotter. The way he talks about it, like it’s the simplest, most obvious thing in the world, heat pools in my neck and ears while my fingertips are left cold and kind of clammy. He says it so easy. _I took you home._ Like it isn’t weird at all. The furthest thing from it, really. He sounds almost proud. Not in a bragging sort of way, but like it happened, and he knows it happened, and he almost can’t believe it but it did. Because he took a varúlfur home with him and that must blow his goddamn mind.

I feel that same way thinking back on it.

Strong, calloused hands hooked in my belt, tugging at it, working it off, lips that taste like whiskey and smoke and a neck that smells like leather and sweat and everything good, everything I _want_. He makes me want things. Things I haven’t needed since Alex passed, and sure there’s a little sting when I think about it, but not enough to dull the feeling. Of wanting a body against mine, of lips and bare skin and roving hands. Of my legs pretzeled around his back, fingers laced in his hair, bodies marred with red hickeys and fresh, ovular bites. Of narrow hips clutched in large, clawed hands. Of a tight, muscular back bowed out beneath me, sweat gleaming like diamond flecks in the moonlight from a tightly closed window, clutching, writhing, _gasping_ , gripping my cock in his vice as I fuck him, maw clamped on the back of his neck. How the bite would terrify him at first, but the hold is gentle, meant for balance, and it never breaks the skin.

_I took you home,_ Robert says, so full of pride and awe. Like it was something he can hardly believe happened, because it did happen and he isn’t ashamed. Isn’t scared. It happened, and he likes that it happened. Maybe wants it to happen again.

He took me home, but all I can think about is what _I_ want to take.

I swallow.

“I did,” I say, softer and strained.

A simple statement. Nothing telling, I think. But to him, it must tell plenty.

“You still heading my way?” he asks me, subtly looking me up and down in a way that in no uncertain terms makes me want to wrench that leather jacket off his shoulders and bite into the first patch of skin I find.

“I haven’t moved.”

“ _My way_ , I mean—Jesus, you know what I mean.” Robert’s smirk never once falters.

“Oh, I know. I’m just making sure you actually want me there.” I pause, thinking. “And that this isn’t a ploy to harvest my organs to sell as aphrodisiacs on the black market.”

He has just enough forethought and time to take his cigarette between his fingers before laughing so hard his entire body shakes. There’s nothing fake or forced about it. God, he looks incredible when he smiles like that.

“I dunno, wolf pelts are at a premium, I hear. I bet yours’d fetch a dime, big and pretty as you are.” Robert looks me up and down, and this time there’s nothing subtle or secretive about it. His eyes are dark, half-lidded, and hungry. It stuns me in place, shivering with a deep, throbbing want, and a wonder if maybe he wants to rip my clothes off just as badly. “Might take me a while to get you naked, but I got plenty of knives. Don’t have any in silver, though.”

Pretty, he calls me. _Pretty._ Like eight feet of dagger teeth and meat hooks staring him down, holding him by the throat is fucking _beautiful_.

“Good, ‘cause you do that and you might just find yourself on the receiving end of more than you can handle.”

Something in his eyes flashes suspiciously close to exhilaration, but it’s reigned in before I can really make up my mind and just blame it on the alcohol. Before I know it we’re standing at his front door, and Robert stubs his cigarette out in an ash tray on the window sill. He gets his keys, and it’s while he’s fumbling for the right key that I notice his hands are shaking. That _he’s_ shaking. And I’m standing close to him. Really close.

I back off a step, the movement enough to draw his attention.

“Robert,” I start to say, keeping my tone subdued as realization of what this is dawns on me, “are you sure about this? You don’t have to. If you’re nervous . . . I understand. I can just go—”

“I’m not nervous. Just had too much to drink,” he quickly cuts in.

My jaw tightens, but I hold my ground. That wouldn’t make it any better regardless.

“You drank less than I did, and way less than we usually do.”

“Look, I—” Robert starts, cutting his attention from his keys and straight over at me, but the minute he meets my eyes that something in them is suddenly gone.

I deflate, but the disappointment isn’t as palpable as expected. Guess the alcohol is helping on that front. But this is fine. I’d be lying if a big chunk of me wasn’t also expecting it.

“I get it, Robert,” I say, understanding and gently smiling. “It’s okay. Really. I get it.”

I mean it, but while he doesn’t look at me I figure he’s got to know it because I’m ready to turn back to my place and call it a night before Amanda eats the entire bucket of fresh chocolate ice cream—which my dad senses tell me has to be happening right now—but his voice stops me.

He sounds tired, speaks slow, and as he does the keys stop rattling as his hand stills. “Okay. So maybe I am a bit nervous. Maybe I didn’t know the first time, but that . . . isn’t exactly the kinda thing you tell a one-night-stand. You didn’t tell me and never wanted me to find out; I don’t blame you. I’ll say it a million fuckin’ times ‘cause it’s the truth. I wouldn’t have wanted me to know, either. But that doesn’t mean I didn’t enjoy having you over. Or that . . . I don’t want you over again. Because, well, damn, I _do_. And maybe that’s . . . maybe’s that’s something you didn’t expect to hear, but it’s true, too.”

My stomach raises into my chest. A tight, flippy, fluttery sensation. Not unpleasant or unkind to an alcohol-laden belly. Kind of like vertigo but not vomit inducing. Nice, even.

“Even though . . . ?”

“Even though I know, yeah. What you told me tonight, and how things went the first time, I know you won’t hurt me. If anything, it. . . .” He trails off, jaw tensing through the clench of his teeth, and he runs his hand through his hair, tugging it in ways that makes me want it to be my fingers combing it, pulling him back by it, throat bared and beautiful, the perfect fit for my teeth, and finally scratches at the nape of his neck. When he speaks, his voice is lower. Sonorous and gravelly and thick as honey, “If anything, it makes me want you more, knowing what you are.”

I just kind of stare at him for a minute. More like gawk. Heartbeat looping through disorienting palpitations. 

“R-really?”

Robert staggers where he stands as if I’ve physically hit him with the question, walls slamming into place. He looks at me under a cloud of indignation. “What? You trusted me with this, yet you hardly _know_ me. You think that’s weird? ‘Cause I don’t.”

“Hell no, Robert, that’s not what I— Look, you—you just told me you want me _because_ of what I am, not in spite of it. Like it isn’t weird, like-like it doesn’t bother you I’m not human and that’s—Robert, you . . . you—I—”

I can’t get it out. There aren’t words for this. Suddenly, I’m painfully aware of where my hands are and where I want them to be and they _aren’t_.

“I _what_?” he asks, looking genuinely annoyed now. Like it’s the most obvious thing in the world, this realization I’ve just come to, and me being hung up on it is exasperating to him.

I can’t think. Can barely breathe. As a thousand thoughts race through my mind the impulse to grab him, pin him to the wall, and kiss him for all I’m worth is there. It’s there and it’s _strong_. But I don’t. Somehow, all I can do is freeze. Everything is heavy as the cacophony swirling in my head refuses to break into order. It won’t slow down, only speeds up.

There are two rickety old lawn chairs on the porch. Without asking, I slump into one. Head in my hands because this is really happening. I’m here and he wants me to be here and we’re talking about it—kind of. Yet, still, I freeze. Sit numbly because there’s a hurricane in my head whirling between the part of me that wants to be inside his home bent over the first horizontal surface we find and the other part that can’t move no matter how hard I try.

It takes time—how much, I haven’t the faintest—but Robert sits wordlessly in the chair across from me. I don’t look at him, but it’s not tough to guess that even his usual façade is cracked with worry. Because so is mine, big time. And I’m overthinking this like I always do but how could I not overthink _this_? Get on my level, this is what I do best.

“I think . . . maybe we should talk about this. . . .” It comes out soft, clipped. Devoid of emotion because there’s just so freaking much of it already in me. Maybe Robert doesn’t like small talk but _fuck-it_ this isn’t going to be an idle nonsense kind of chat.

Robert is quiet, shifts next to me, and as I run both hands backwards over my scalp, raking my fingers through my hair until the sting hauls me by the bootstraps out of an F5 twister, he leans his elbows on his knees. His focus is on me. Quiet, serious.

“Okay,” is all he says.

Guess I’m starting, then.

“Robert, the first time we did this, it was just a hook-up, right?”

He doesn’t answer right away. Just looks blankly towards the ground, hands hanging between his knees, jaw working like he’s chewing on something. Maybe wanting another cigarette or maybe some whiskey; he goes for neither. He doesn’t want to answer. _I don’t do anything I don’t wanna do._ He grins in the marina lights when he says it, because the thought of him doing anything else is unfathomable. He doesn’t want to answer me, and I wonder cryptically if pushing him to is the right thing to do.

When he answers, it comes in the form of a single, shallow nod. It stings, more than a little, but I’m grateful for his honesty all the same.

“But you still wanted to be my friend anyway?”

Again, he just nods. Not emphatically. Not some huge revelation. Just an affirmation of truth. He sits back, stretches his legs out in front of him. The chair creaks slightly.

“You were new around. Awkward and drunk,” he says in a solemn way. “Thought maybe it was my fault, too. Figured I could give you the chance after you apologized.”

* * *

Sitting curbside with a bottle of fruity, refreshing wine is not how I saw tonight unfolding, maybe not after getting invited to bar hop with the rugged Robert Small, and after Mary skipped us to sing sea shanties to some poor kid half her age. Fighting back the awkwardness and impulse to blush because there’s some wine on his lip and when he licks it away my mind floods with the thought that a few days ago maybe I could have done that for him. And the shame that fills me with because my first intimate night with someone in more than a year and it was a fling.

I _hate_ flings.

“I’m sorry about before,” I tell him, ears and tail tucked somewhere behind the façade. He looks at me, and I feel the red heat of regret flare up from the pit of my stomach across my shoulders and face. How his gaze is heavy with expectance. “No excuses, I just. . . . I think we both deserve better than what happened.” I don’t clarify further, but I know he has to be thinking it.

I look at him, eyes pleading yet hopelessly lost in remorse. In how blankly he stares at me.

Robert sets his bottle between his boots, rubs a tattooed hand over the back of his neck, and lets out a breath so heavy and rough it sounds almost as pained as I feel.

“Do over,” he says after a moment’s pause. Mutters almost wholly for himself, “Just this once.”

My smile is tiny, tentative, and so fragile a misplaced glance might shatter it into oblivion. I extend a hand which is in turn stared at with a thick, raised eyebrow.

“John Maverick. I take my whiskey straight and like moonlit strolls and awful werewolf movies. It cool if we hang? I promise not to fuck you this time.”

Robert chuffs, takes a swig of his wine, and when he lowers it again he’s grinning. Honest to god grinning as he fits his hand around mine and squeezes.

“Robert Small. I’m that asshole who never talks about himself,” he says. “Let’s throw rocks at shit.”

* * *

“Wasn’t hard t’see you never did that before,” he tells me, now.

I almost smile, don’t have the stomach to. “I meant it, you know. About us deserving better. This. Whatever _this_ is—I can’t do another hook-up, Robert. You’re my best friend, and one of two people in this whole damn state who knows why I don’t like my own reflection sometimes. I can’t go home tomorrow and pretend whatever this turns into didn’t happen. We deserve better than that.”

I’m rambling. Fuck, I can feel it, but the words are just spilling out of me and if I don’t get it out now I never will and that will eat me alive the rest of my life.

“I can’t do a fling, not again. If that isn’t in the cards for you then I understand, believe me, I do, but then I gotta call it here. I’m not going to risk our friendship just so we can have sex and go our merry ways again—I can’t.” My head drops into my hands not because I’m shaking, think I’m going to cry, or even because it’s hard to keep my head up, but because that’s just where it feels like it should be in that moment. “I can’t let it be hollow, Robert. I hate flings. If this is gonna happen, I need it to be _real_ or not happen at all.”

He’s quiet. For a long time, neither of us speaks. I can barely even breathe. If he reached for a cigarette or fiddled with a knife it might just be a welcome reprieve. Show he needs his hands doing something because in his head there’s so much more going on. More that isn’t as obvious as it is in mine.

So, he doesn’t speak, and I don’t expect him to. Never have and never will no matter how badly I need him to. Am only surprised when he does.

“Do wolves really mate for life?” he asks.

I pick my head up in a blinding, bewildered flash of _what in blue hell do wolves have to do with—?_

Oh.

A different heat flushes up into my face, and I look at the grass. “With Alex, I did, but it’s not a biological drive. It’s like it is with humans. You find someone you care about and you just keep caring about them until suddenly you’ve met the folks, moved in, and started a family together. All wholesome and copacetic like. Provided it’s what you both want.”

Robert bobs his chin in another slow nod. He pats me on the shoulder, squeezes a little, and the tension floods out of me like a broken levy. Warmth like satin at the point where he touches me, and I want to lean into it. Close my eyes and lean until we’re shoulder to shoulder, and maybe this doesn’t actually lead to anything after all but I’d be okay with that, too. Because it’s him, and it’s off my chest, and I think I can finally breathe.

His shifting is what gets my attention—when did I close my eyes?—and I find Robert is closer. Leaned nearer in his chair beside me. Dark eyes that are dim but shine in the light of the yellow street lamp. It will never frame him as well as the moon does.

My heart stutters, satin under my skin when his hand slides to cup the back of my neck, and I feel myself being pulled ever so slightly.

“Want that, too, John. This to be real,” he gruffly murmurs, eyes flicking back and forth between mine. Like he can’t pick just one. “I hate hook-ups. But you gotta understand: I ain’t a good man. One day you’re gonna want better than me. Deserve better.”

I hesitate for a second. Gaze intensely at him, a flare of uncertainty for where in the world that came from. Somewhere I can’t possibly know or understand, I figure, but maybe like his tattoo that can be one more mystery to be unraveled with enough time and careful patience.

“You’re right. You’re not a good man,” I whisper. Robert averts his gaze, stung but like he expected it, and starts to turn away, but before he can my fingertips gingerly graze his cheek, rasping through the prickly stubble there. When he looks at me, he’ll see a cheeky grin, thumb grazing the hard edge of his cheek bone. “You’re fuckin’ incredible.”

Something in him flares, and the purest freaking smile I’ve seen in years tugs at the corner of his mouth.

When he kisses me, it’s like the entire cosmos centers on that one point. On warm, soft lips and stubble scraping my cheek. My hand that glides behind his ear, twining in the locks at the back of his head. Pulling him closer, deeper, lips moving against my own. Until he pulls me with him as he stands, fingers hooked in my belt loops, tugs me forward, kisses me so deep I think my stars literally cross.

My fingers dig fistfuls of leather as he walks back, leading me along. Towards his front door. I push with my hips, and Robert hisses sweetly when his lower back collides with the doorknob, grabs me by the sides of my neck, and kisses me so hard like he means to devour me.

Robert growls a rough, rhetorical, “Shit, where did you come from . . . ?” against my lips.

I smirk, can’t resist. “Michigan. Bray Road to be exact.”

He hums like he might just believe it. “You wanna take this inside?”

There’s a beat where my jaw tightens a little, gaze falling to somewhere between his unfairly sculpted pectoral muscles and the hollow of his clavicle.

I say it not because I don’t know the answer, but because I need to _hear it_. “Not a fling?”

“Not a fling.”

I nod once, grip either side panel of his ridiculously sexy leather jacket, and yank him flush against me. “Then get me inside before the whole cul-de-sac sees me ripping your clothes off.”

* * *

The key slides into the lock, the door is open, and he yanks me through by the cuff. There isn’t even a thought in my head about turning lights on. Isn’t room for thoughts when firm hands take rough hold of my hips and slam the door crisply shut with my back. His lips cover mine so fast our teeth clash. I laugh windily, taste copper to the same tune of a pinched upper lip, moan, and it’s gone in a flood of smoke and beer and his tongue slides along my own, sucking me in, devouring me. I whimper; he growls, bites my lower lip, tugs lightly.

The dichotomy strikes me for the barest instant and I smile. His hands slide beneath my shirt, pushing the fabric up my stomach, yanks my buckle free, gets to work on my jeans.

I want this. I realize it with a flare of blinding clarity as his lips graze the shell of my ear, breathing hot down the side of my neck. God, I want this so _bad_.

“Robert . . . w-wait. . . . Stop.”

He stiffens, every atom slamming still, reels back, and stares at me, hands locked where they are.

“No biting?” he asks.

“What? No, no, it’s not—I am so okay with that on so many levels—I just. . . . Are you sure about this?”

He stares at me, eyebrows knitted in the middle like that’s the most ludicrous thing he’s ever heard a partner ask before sex. Finally he shakes his head, laces his fingers with the hair at the back of my head, and speaks with his lips merged to the corner of my mouth, “Stop asking me that. I _want_ you, John. Ain’t that enough?”

I shiver.

It is. God, it is. Or, it should be, but. . . .

“But do you trust me?” I ask.

He leans away again, providing the break I need to breathe without bursting out of my own skin. His frustration is more obvious this time.

“What’s that got to—?”

I cut him off, knowing I won’t be able to continue this if he finishes that sentence. Stronger this time, undeterred. “Do you _trust_ me, Robert?”

He doesn’t answer right away. In the dark, he looks me in the eyes, and he must be able to see me. Maybe not as well as I see him, but he can. And he knows what he’s looking for, and he sees it, the rough pad of his thumb grazing behind my ear and I nearly fold on the spot.

“Enough.”

“Enough for this?”

_“Enough,”_ he repeats, takes the back of my neck, and kisses me so hard I melt beneath his hands.

That’s the last of it. Tension pours out of me in liquid form, replaced by a heated throb that pulsates right up through my groin, and I push the jacket off his shoulders while he shrugs the last of the way through it, determined not to lose my lips, but relents so I can pull my shirt over my head. Boots and shoes come off next, stumbling and too rushed to bother with the laces, and in the next instant rough hands are clutching my sides, thumbing the crest of my hip bones through the skin, and shoves me into the cold wall. Picture frames rattle above and beside me; I gasp, shiver, but all that takes a backseat to the whimper he squeezes out of me when his knee pushes my thighs apart and _presses_.

“Do you want this?” he asks, more gravelly and erotic than any mortal man has a right to be.

I gasp. “Yes.”

“How do you want me, John?”

“Jesus—fuck, Robert, just— _fuck_ me. I _want_ you.”

He smirks so loud at that. Like the cat that caught the freaking canary, and I don’t feel a simulacrum of shame for dropping two sexually charged F-bombs on the same breath because what the hell, Amanda isn’t here, and she’d be irked by my headlong dive into hypocrisy but now seems like as good a time for it as any.

“You sure about that? Don’t sound too positive.” Even now he teases me.

I curl my fingers in his shoulder, squeezing hard enough to bruise. He groans. “Fuckin—I’m not telling, Robert. I’m _asking_. _Please._ I _want_ you.”

“You want me to fuck you.” He says it so reverently. Like a prayer.

_“Yes,”_ I gasp, pressing every inch of me into every atom of him.

Cradling his jaw in both hands, I push kiss after kiss just beneath the hard edge of bone, rasping my teeth across his pulse, prickling my lips on his stubble. I ache, deep. Does he even know? Know what this does to me? Kisses and nips and whines pressed into the hard edge just below his jawline, under his chin, what they do to me, what they’re meant to do?

Maybe he doesn’t know, but he has an idea.

Robert growls. The sound laces a hot lance of _want you, need you now, fuck me, fuck it all, need you **now**_ down my spine to my cock. Fingers curl into my ass as strong as any claws, and he hoists me up, my legs hook instinctively around his waist with a startled thrill—oh, fuck _yes_ —and navigates his way through the dark, teeth plying my lips with hungry kisses, and lowers us onto the couch. His breath is labored in my ear, hot gusts lighting up the skin on my neck and shoulder, flush with blood, and when he bites down it almost undoes me on the spot. My back arches, bucks, whining through open lips, squeezing my thighs around his hips pushing for more contact and, yes, there he is, raging hard in his jeans.

I reach for it, tracing the outline under my palm, squeeze until the words coming out of his mouth are vile and strained and only half coherent in the best way imaginable. He practically rips his shirt pulling it off, sunglasses clattering where they land, and I try to make a mental note of it so as not to step on them later—don’t succeed—and pretzel my legs tighter around the backs of his thighs.

“What, no show? I brought singles and everything.” I grin up at him, savoring the view of him barely lit by ambient light. A triangle of dark hair adorns his chest and around his naval where a thin strip connects downward to lower reaches.

“If you got a twenty in there, I’ll _really_ put on a show,” he chortles. It thrums in his chest like pure sex.

I shiver, knead the outline of his cock in slow, even squeezes, haul myself up with a hand gripping the couch back, and crush my lips on his so hard our teeth collide. Then I’m biting his lips, his jaw, then he’s biting me, sharp nips that force whimpers out of me, head tipping back until he pins my shoulders to the couch. He covers my hand with his, pushing it _right there_ , rolling his hips, his whole body into my palm, and it’s the sharp pinch of his teeth on my collar that resends that white hot blaze into my groin. Somewhere amid the shuffle of grasping and grinding I shove my jeans and everything down my hips, button popping loose and the zipper scratching my inner thigh, tug out of my socks, kick it all away, and I yank his belt roughly back on top of me.

It’s something about the earnestness of the situation, desperate and awkward like high schoolers in the backseat of a car too small for us. All the grasping and tugging, clumsy and maybe a little out of practice—we’ve done this before, sure, but a one-night-stand hardly makes up for the length of time since my last partner—and something about that must enamor him because Robert is chuckling as he pushes the waist of his jeans past his hips, grabs my arms roughly, pins them over my head, and the alignment of the world all snaps back into place.

Robert is staring at me, the sexiest fucking smirk I’ve ever seen curled on the corner of his mouth, hair even messier than is normal for him, a jagged stripe of raised skin across his chest, and so damn pleased by the sight of me splayed out and hard beneath him, the outline of his bulge teasing, calling at me, demanding my attention.

“Christ, you’re so fucking— _damn_. Lemme get the condom on,” he grouses.

I blush, consider the new information that flares to the forefront of my brain, and take his wrist when he frees it to fumble in a drawer beside the couch. Because of course he keeps a supply in his living room. My grip isn’t tight, isn’t forceful. He could break it with a tug and I’d let him without a second thought, but he looks at me and the question is there.

My ears go hotter.

“You . . . you don’t have to,” I mutter while fighting not to burst. Pretending there isn’t fur bristling beneath my skin, claws edging just under my fingertips, like there isn’t a maw full of teeth beneath my jaw that beg to be latched around his neck, grasping, supporting, claiming.

Robert looks at me like I really might be about to explode. Not frightened, just . . . confused. Like he should be seeing something other than what he currently does.

“Yes, I do,” he replies, like it’s the first step to any tango. Last time it was reflex, and I didn’t question it because that’s how it should go. The first and most important rule: practiced, comfortable, routine. It’s incredibly reassuring.

“No, what I mean is. . . .” I scramble for the best way to word this, come up short, and resort to something clinical and utterly un-sexy. “We can’t catch anything from each other. My immune system . . . it’s better than a human’s. Like, crazy better. What I am—my, er, species—we can’t get sick, don’t carry diseases. Even if you did have something—and I’m not saying you do—I can’t get it and can’t transmit it. Not that I’m saying I _don’t_ want you to use a condom. By all means. I just thought you might like to know. . . .”

I trail off, further embarrassment rushing liquid fire up into my ears because dammit I’m rambling and he’s just staring at me and why is his brow raised like that don’t judge me I’m trying to be open and honest about this!

Robert settles on a head shake. “Do you want me to use a condom?”

“I mean, if you want to then that’s totally cool—”

“John.” 

I stop.

“Didn’t ask what you think I want. What do _you_ want?”

I glance away from him, the heavy satin of his gaze pulling across my skin, making it spike into goose bumps. It’s heated with a thick, roiling flame of desire, yet tempered by the hesitance I’ve put into it without meaning to. What do I want? You, you sexy, rugged, reckless, knife-wielding, chain-smoking, whiskey drinking lunatic! And I’m lying naked beneath him on his couch hard as a freaking boulder, and he still has damn boxers on—why does he still have his boxers on?—yet even completely nude he doesn’t see _me_. Because this isn’t what I really look like. My face is one he probably sees peering around corners in nightmares where eyes flash yellow-green in full moonlight and drips crimson and ichor from its maw.

“I want—” I shiver.

—you to not fear me.

_“I would never hurt you,”_ I rumble as he gawks, wide eyes rimmed by beads of sweat on his brow. Horror, confusion, adrenaline. All mixing, stinging in my nostrils. Darting into the safety of night-blackened trees so my heart can race with the run and not the crippling terror of being _found_.

—you to see me.

He grins helplessly, barely containing the giggles I see tickling the corners of his eyes because the mental image of Bigfoot gently whacking a ball through a hoop has got to be the funniest damn thing he’s pictured all week. I smile, too, not at my own words—although they are pretty funny—but because he’s smiling with his eyes closed. Closed like he isn’t worried about claws like butcher knives or fangs that grasp and wrench and tear. Closed because, in that moment, I’m not a monster and he’s not a man. We’re just two people sitting, enjoying a smoke, a fire, a bubbling brook, and a laugh.

—you to trust me.

_“Enough for this?”_ I breathe, the words a fist in my chest.

_“Enough,”_ he repeats between tight teeth. Stern, brow furrowed like the intensity of his desire pains him. He says it, and while it isn’t a no it certainly doesn’t sound like a yes.

—this to be real.

_“Not a fling?”_

_“Not a fling.”_

He kisses me with a want so deep that I believe him.

“—you to not use a condom,” I say, eyes averted, blushing bone-deep. “I want you to feel good, too. Want to make you feel good.”

Warm, balmy breath puffs delicately on my cheek, tightening the skin on my neck. Smoke and beer are not faint on his breath, but there’s more than that. There’s _him_ , and it’s all around me. Sweat, leather, smoke, and the dry earth that crumbles in my claws like mountains wain under the steady ebb and flow of time; like lilacs and old cologne and a life that hasn’t been easy, hasn’t been kind, but what life ever is?

He noses into my throat, teeth and stubble razing my throbbing pulse, presses kisses into my jaw, under my chin, and I fall back onto the couch with eyes blown wide. I shiver. I shake. Because I want him like mad and he’s here, and he takes my hand and pushes it into his straining fly and rolls his hips, grinding his hard cock into my palm.

“You already do,” Robert moans, teeth bared against the corner of my mouth, inhaling deeply through his nose.

The heat returns in a rush, blazing a trail from the crown of my head straight down to my dick. I bite my lip and loop my free arm around his neck, kissing him harder than I’ve kissed in what feels like decades, sucking each other’s tongues amid hungry moans and grasping fingers. Biting his bottom lip red and swollen, I growl.

“Fuck me,” I whisper into his parted lips. Don’t plead for it. Don’t beg. Demand.

“Won’t be gentle.”

“Don’t want you to be.”

Robert hums, and it sounds so completely satisfied by my answer. He reaches over me, fumbles through the drawer as I ply at him with kisses. At some point his movements require the use of both hands, and I take the moment to wrap my fingers around my dick, tragically ignored up to this point and absolutely hating me for it, and jerk it in slow, hard pulls. My head falls back with a breathy sigh, eyes fluttering closed, and breathe in the dark silhouette of him.

“’S a good look for you,” he mumbles above me, and though I can’t see his eyes I feel them on me. “Keep it up.”

Doesn’t take much encouraging; I’m already there. The drawer shuts with a crisp slam that rattles its contents, and when my eyes drift back into focus he has what I first think is a travel sized bottle of hand sanitizer balanced in his teeth, but the bottle is curved and wavy and has a two toned label I realize is supposed to be purple. Because of course Robert keeps an emergency supply of lube in that drawer, I think, suddenly in awe of his commitment to the craft while stroking my cock and admiring how he sits back on his heels just enough to shove his boxers the rest of the way down his thighs. His dick is free with a breathy sigh before he uncaps the bottle, pours a generous amount into his hand and lathers it into his shaft with rough strokes.

I watch, dim eyes greedy, and listen to the wet slick of his palm working his length.

“Gimme your hand,” he orders nebulously.

I do.

“Other hand.”

I furrow my brow at him, reluctantly suspending my own touch. He takes my wrist, his hand warm and wet with lubricant, and squirts a liberal amount on my fingers and palm.

“Why do I feel like this is going to be infused with chili powder?” I wonder aloud.

Robert’s smirk is so loud it practically sings between my ears when he speaks. “Oh, it absolutely is. It’s great for the libido. Always works for me. A little bit of pain below the belt to really get you _hot_.”

I smile. At least until I realize he probably isn’t joking, not about the last part at least. Because then I’m chuckling, too. “Good to know.”

I lie back, sighing blissfully as I glide my hand smoothly up and down, watching him stroke himself in the dim, ambient light. His free hand craters in the cushion beside my head, and even though it feels so good to touch myself like this—with voracious eyes boring into me, drinking me in, my hand, my cock—it isn’t nearly enough.

I twitch reflexively when he palms the rise of my ass, glides his fingertips across my skin. A light tickle to an overly gentle caress, but it feels nice—! The thought cuts short when Robert plants a playful swat to my ass and wrenches an irreverent start out of me. No real force behind it, but it’s still a shock, and I give his chest a shove and fix him in an ireless smirk.

_“Ass,”_ I glower.

“And a fine ass it is.”

Robert adds more lube to his hand and slides his fingers along the cleft of my ass, slathering me with it as he goes, cool and warming at the same time. A shiver dances across my skin, lower lip pinched between my teeth, and hitch a sigh into a moan when he slips the first finger into me. Just testing the waters, curling it slow, sliding in to the second knuckle before I nod and he adds another. The discomfort is mild and fleeting, and I drop my head back and jerk myself harder, just above his tempo. Only to buck and gasp aloud when they start to scissor inside me.

It’s good. It’s so fucking good, but it’s not nearly enough.

“Robert, please,” I whine, breath quickening with a shudder as I tighten my grip, jerking my hand as a low, steady pulse of rising pleasure settles and grows in my lower stomach.

I don’t need to ask any more than that. He quickly wipes his hand on his pant leg and grasps the back of my knee, pushing my leg up, opening me to him. I tremble, whine. My lower back protests a little, but not enough for me to call it. I twitch when his cock bumps the back of my thigh while guiding himself into place.

“Not gonna be gentle,” he reminds me, strain clear in the gravelly husk of his tone.

I sigh, smirk, slide my fingers up the back of his neck and pull him swiftly down. Cradling his head, kissing him with a long, needy moan shivering its way from my lips into his and down the length of his spine to his cock; some lube smears his hair, but I’m pretty sure he’ll forgive me.

I lean away, pulling his bottom lip in my teeth, and bare my teeth and neck when I tell him, “Good.”

He withdraws, and I’m about to beg him when he lines himself up and sinks into me.

My head snaps back and I cry out. Not because it hurts. It really doesn’t. I’m a little out of practice, sure, but I know how to do this and I still love the feeling of toys inside me, but it’s _him_ and he’s here and he’s inside me. But it’s different than before. Where things were tentative and I was nervous about meeting new people in a new town and chatting with the sexy, rugged loner relaxing at the bar and overwhelmed by alcohol and being kissed and lightly bit in his dark bedroom, and sure there’s some alcohol here, too, but there’s more than that. More by way of less secrets, because he knows, and there are still some secrets but that’s okay.

Because this isn’t a fling. It’s _real_.

It’s okay that there are secrets because he has them, too. I’m here and he’s with me, and he’s inside me in more ways than literal. He’s in my head, in my lungs, wagging on my tongue as I pant his name, his hips rolling smoothly as he shudders, cursing and saying my name back on the same breath.

He’s not gentle. He moves the instant he knows my whimpers aren’t actually from any kind of pain, gripping me by the back of the knee as he braces his weight on his hand, pushing a hollow into the cushion. He rolls his hips back slow, nearly leaving me, then thrusts forward. My head swims, mouth falling open in a ragged moan. Again and again, the sharp strike of his hips on the backs of my thighs, the light rasp of his body hair on my skin, a few rebellious locks hanging over his brow swaying with him, with me. Grasping his forearm, his shoulder, my fingers curl around him like claws, clasping tight enough to bruise, jaw tight yet gaping.

Sweat pools in the hollow beneath my neck, beads on my brow, slicking my back. Robert never slows, never falters, and when he releases my leg, giving it an easier hold hooked just over his hip, he takes my cock in his fist and jerks roughly until he’s wrenching cries out of me with every firm tug. Heat colors his face and our eyes meet, both partially shuttered, lips apart, huffing desperately. Wet heat, sweet friction blazing through my core, how he fills me out with each thrust, tight with a feeling that dances that line between pain and ecstasy and all I can think is _more, more, more_. Strong arms that shake until he can no longer support his own weight and drops to his elbow, open mouth panting against my lips, my arms scrabbling for purchase on his back.

Moans of his name crumple into _fuck, Robert, god, I can’t, I’m gonna come, I’m gonna come, I can’t—_

“Fuck, yes, that’s it—that’s it, baby, come on,” he growls, huffs, strain rolling tension across his shoulders, powerful breath scalding my throat. His teeth that graze my ear, the side of my neck, stubble scratching my skin until he covers my pulse with his lips, shivers pushing me higher, faster, harder. “Come for me. Come for me— _fuck_ , I’m right behind you. . . . Where do you want me? Where do you want me, John?”

“In me,” I gasp, don’t even need to think about it. “Come in me, Robert. I want you— _shit_ , I’m _gonnaaaa_ —!”

I don’t get to finish, can’t so much as fathom wanting to.

Swelling, tightening, _tightening_ behind my eyes. Muscles clench, grip my legs around his back, curled fingers pressing crescent cuts into ombre shoulder blades and trail long, thick red welts as they pull down his back. Everything crests in a rush of red light behind my eyes, hips jerk, and I come with a long, strangled cry in his hand. He’s right there with me, trembling and taut, skin to skin, chest to chest, mouth open and teeth closed against my shoulder, and shudders inside me with a voluminous exhale, filling me with a wet rush of heat.

We fall into each other, hot and slick with sweat and come, tangle of limbs and heaving lungs. I carefully extricate my fingers from where they’ve dug in, raised lines of welts rent in streaks down his back, and stroke them with a muttered, half-coherent apology. 

My ears pound, and I don’t know if he replies or not, don’t know if he’s even heard me or if I said anything in English. It’s a moment before anything settles enough that I can hear beyond my own heartbeat.

Robert is chuckling. His chest shudders just a little harder than my own, shoulders quivering beneath my hands, and I can’t even fathom the hazy-eyed look of bliss he must see when he lifts his head from the crook of my neck, looks at me through tousled locks curled and clumped with sweat, and smirks.

“I bet your howl is even prettier,” he hums.

I smile breathily, caress the nape of his neck. “You bet it freakin’ is.”

He descends, and I pull him the rest of the way into a deep, airy kiss.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Things to live for: when John slips up and curses instead of being the wholesome wolf-dad he wants to be (because we all know that swear jar is for him not Amanda)
> 
> Thank you all so much for your wonderful love and support! I know this isn't what anyone wants to hear, but due to work related reasons I'm going to need to go down to an every-other-week update schedule; however, I will be trying to make the chapters longer. I can't even express how grateful I am for how sweet and supportive you all are; I love you guys to bits! <3


	12. Strawberries

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Good things come to those who fight for it.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> For any who haven't seen it, John's profile has been overhauled and now features a better picture and some cute synopses of his character! Click [here](http://crescentmoondemon.tumblr.com/post/165566760598#notes) to see it!
> 
> Here is the link to the [Terminology Master Post](http://crescentmoondemon.tumblr.com/post/165422480878#notes) which is updated each time new cyptid info comes to light.

Awake.

It happens sudden, yet not with a start. My eyes are open and nothing is reeling, just thirsty. It’s all bathed in stillness, quiet, and an overlying scent that is definitely not my house—current or old—and a softness that is definitely not my bed. I shift to sit up, wince, everything comes flooding back in a raging blush, go with my better judgment, and flop back onto the couch with a groan, lower back aching something fierce. For a second, I weigh the pros and cons of rummaging around in the dark for a possible medicine cabinet which may or may not have ibuprofen, but ultimately decide to just let the discomfort linger. It’s not terrible, merely a nuisance, and it comes with the deeply satisfying notion of having been fucked boneless.

I hum as I roll onto my side and nestle under the warm heft of well-worn leather. The scent of it is pervasive. It’s him and I would know it anywhere. But it’s not as potent without the heightened senses that come with a muzzle full of canine teeth. Sweat, leather, earth. Smoke. I pull it up my chest and drape it over my shoulder, tenderly brushing the collar with my nose, and breathe deeply, groaning when my dick stirs with renewed interest.

I’m alone in his living room.

I inch up onto my elbows as much as my back will allow and call softly into the dark, “Robert?”

I listen, but nothing shifts or stirs and no voice calls back to me.

Just to be sure, I allow a tiny portion of myself to slip. My sinuses tingle while a faint _pop_ sounds somewhere in my brain, and all at once the world comes sharply into focus. Musky scent of sweat, leather, perfume of sex, bitter tang of alcohol and socks, clean and damp soil from potted plants in the corners, succulents on the coffee table, low hum of the AC vent in the upper wall, ceiling fan ticking an inconsistent rhythm somewhere else in the house. Tomato sauce, melted cheese, pineapple. Barrel aged whiskey and outlines of clothes on the floor—his and mine—and framed records on the wall and the broad, shiny expanse of a flat screen TV. It’s a beautiful home. A little cluttered, but no less lovely. Truly, his truck is the oldest thing he owns.

But no Robert.

I expand my hearing further, feel the phantom twitch and pivot of wolfish ears beneath my skin, and find it. Running water upstairs, faint hint of body wash, and the cut of the sprayer as a body shifts in front of the water. A smile curls across my lips, and I fall onto my back, pull my legs and the jacket up, and breathe him in with a whole new urgency. Efficiency. The tension of the past day had me crumpled in a psychological heap, but now it’s all been bled out of me and I can breathe again—without the crushing weight of _is my family going to be okay?_ imploding in on me. In contrast, I’m so relaxed now my heartbeat stutters behind my ribs, inhale from his jacket, and run my hand over my stirring cock.

I take my time with it. Breathe him in while listening to the hum of hot water pulsing through the pipes. Stroke myself to the cadence of a heartbeat that still courses through my ears almost as loud as my own, because it’s his and I feel it where his chest pushes into mine. Muscles not suited for human skin roll and flex beneath the surface, but I hold back, biting my lip, centering myself with the sting. Fingers strong in their passion, they fist in the leather and I bury my nose in him, his neck, feel the phantom press of fangs on his shoulder, bucking my hips, thrusting into his tight heat, and come with a snarl. Blunt teeth clamp into the collar, spilling into my hand while a shudder quakes in my ribcage.

It takes a moment for the world to stop spinning, and when it does I rein my senses back in and clean myself off with the inside leg of my boxers. With his jacket still draped around my shoulders, it’s while fumbling with my pants I rediscover my phone.

Guilt floods into me all at once as I remember Amanda’s worried expression over dinner, telling her I thought I might meet with Robert after all tonight. My solemn promise to call or message her the soonest I had a break to let her know I was okay and headed home. The screen flicks on the instant it’s turned over, and I squint through the sudden light. It’s 2:26am, and I have a text from Amanda at 11:14pm asking how I am and when I’ll be home. 

Throwing out my concern about waking her on a school night, I immediately text back.

> _Dadman: Sorry getting back to you so late. Everythings fine. Talk went well. Strawberry poptarts in cabinet if u want some. Be home before you go to school. Love you!_

An innocuous message with an innocuous code word. The same one her father and I cooked up when she was still in elementary school, because Amanda loves anything strawberry and anything with frosting and every pastry under the sun. Strawberry Pop-Tarts mean “good morning, honey,” smiling at each other, maybe laughing at some ridiculous joke a little too dad-oriented, _everything is okay, I’m fine, you don’t need to worry._

There’s a beat, and then the timestamp tells me the message has been read. Emojis come through in quick succession.

> _Manda Panda: smiley face – thumbs up – confetti – confetti – heart – confetti – heart – heart – heart_  
>  _Manda Panda: heart – heart – house – heart – heart_  
>  _Manda Panda: 100%?_

I smile at the screen and send a few back.

> _Dadman: 100%!_  
>  _Dadman: wolf – panda bear – house – thumbs up – 100%_  
>  _Dadman: crescent moon – stars – panda bear – bed – heart_
> 
> _Manda Panda: heart – heart – heart_  
>  _Manda Panda: heart – wolf – panda bear – heart_  
>  _Manda Panda: stars – bed – Zzzzzz.._  
> 
> 
> _Dadman: haha Goodnight, panda. Love you_
> 
> _Manda Panda: Nite dad, love u 2_

I set four alarms as insurance, turn off the screen, and gather all my clothes in my arms and take them upstairs. I’ve seen his bedroom once before, and while the last time I didn’t exactly pause to take things in, it feels the same. Queen size bed that likely hasn’t been made since the last time the sheets were washed. Light from a single bedside lamp reveals similar patterns of clutter, of scattered bottles at various levels of partially to mostly drank, glasses abound, an open case of beer, floor to ceiling curtains partially drawn to a sliding glass door leading to a small balcony, and interspersed with comfortable assortments of socks, pants, shirts, and boxers on the floor. The kind of bedroom Amanda would chastise me for weeks about if I allowed to happen. A thought that, though fleeting, makes me wonder where Robert’s family is.

The source of the shower noises is not hard to find. The bathroom door is open and steam is billowing out of the gap at the top of an opaque glass door. The shower light is the only one on; the room is dim but far from dark. Much as I want to gawk at the silhouette behind the glass (of one raised arm moving over his head, and the other positioned low, low in front of him), I avert my eyes reflexively, locate a red armchair free of clutter, put my things in it, and close the balcony curtains the rest of the way.

Robert steps out of the shower, pulling a towel straight onto his head from the hook, and vigorously rubs his hair dry. He notices about when I expect him to and abruptly stops, looks at me as I lean on the doorframe wearing his leather jacket and a smile while watching him in unabashed appreciation.

A slow smirk curves his lips.

“Feel good to be human again?” I hum, pointedly showing how much I admire the view. From top to bottom and everything in-between.

He chuckles musically, dragging the towel behind his shoulders. The white fabric contrasts wonderfully against his arms and chest in the low light. “As human as can be after railing a werewolf into my couch.”

My spine snaps rigid, a fist in my stomach as I reflexively await the icy shot of fright, loathing, and not-so-subtle undertones of hatred that accompany that word. Always has, and I’m damn sure always will. But the way Robert says it, there’s nothing of the sort. Not even close. It’s warm as the steam that rises off his skin, more than a little awed, and looks me up and down as he runs the towel over himself. The look he passes over me isn’t strewn with the same desire as before, but some of it is still there, merely tempered.

“You don’t like being called that?” he asks, picking up on whatever queues must have slipped by.

My eyes dart northward to his face. His hands hang from the ends of the towel slung over the back of his neck now, and he looks at me with arched brows, damp hair clumped and curled against his forehead. Holy jeez, that’s a great look for him.

“I, er,” I scramble for what to say, “usually only get called that when people are screaming. Not many happy memories associated with it.”

“What should I call you, then?”

“Varúlfur, if you can pronounce it. It’s . . . it means werewolf, but in Icelandic. We do have a way of saying what we are, but it’s more a serious of grunts and growls than an actual word.”

“Why Icelandic?”

I shrug one shoulder, twiddling absently with the soft leather sleeve. “People are kinder to cryptids there. I hear there’s a community. Not really a huge deal, though.”

Robert nods like he wants to ask more but, for whatever reason, doesn’t. He slings the towel back onto its hook and stands there facing me, leaning one shoulder on the wall. Looking at me while I look at him. For a long number of beats, neither of us speaks, don’t really move. The quiet is thick but warm, balmy in the radiant humidity. The air is dense with moisture, and it smells so clean. Like . . . lilac soap?

“I wanna see you,” he says, so quietly it’s nearly masked by the faint, echo-y drips from the showerhead.

I grin and cock my head, shifting a little more into the light for him. “You’re looking right at me, Robert.”

“No, I mean. . . . Not this.” Robert motions at me with a hand and looks displeased when the only response I can muster is a confusedly upturned eyebrow. _“You.”_

“What do you—?” I start to say, then realize.

Oh. 

_Oh._

My smile vanishes in a puff of smoke, heart stuttering as it flips, and now I can’t manage to swallow past the fist in my throat when my mouth becomes the Sahara. I feel myself leaning back and don’t fight the impulse to look away when it hits. “That’s not a good idea.”

“Why? I’ve seen you before. Multiple times. We hung out.”

 _“No,”_ I retort sharply before I can formulate a real answer. If he finds the suddenness of my answer suspect, he doesn’t comment on it. “I don’t . . . I don’t want to scare you.”

He takes a step closer. “You don’t, John.”

I frown, fix him with a hard look. “Then you’re even more full of it than you let on.”

Now, he frowns, too.

“I’ve seen you before,” he repeats. “You saved me—twice. Talked to me. You pet my dog. I called you ghost.”

 _And where is Betsy, anyway?_ I think fleetingly. Probably asleep, I guess.

“Yeah, the first time you thought I was going to eat her. The second time was with my hand around your neck, then I nearly ripped a bear’s head off in front of you. Not a great track record. You _should_ be afraid of me, Robert. That’s the issue. Survival instinct and all that.”

Another step shortens the distance from me to him. He isn’t backing down, and I feel myself trying—fighting—to shrink back in response.

“Why should I? You went through so much trouble to tell me all the ways you’re not a danger, yet you’re fixated on the idea I should be scared. Which is it, John?”

My eyes rocket to the ground, shoulders tensing as every nerve fiber tightens my skin, and I can feel myself acting on that impulse to back away. Cower from him as if physically stung, because I think I have.

“I would never hurt you,” I whisper, barely louder than a breath.

“Then why do you want me to be scared?”

“I don’t. I don’t want _anyone_ to be.”

“Then why—?”

“Because that’s just how it is!” I snap, glaring at him with the concentrated ire of a bolt of lightning. My chest pounds, my back shakes. “Humans fear us. We’re _monsters_. It’s how it is. We prowl the lonely places and eat your pets and stalk your children by moonlight. We eat living things and take pleasure when it writhes in our claws. It’s not the Dover Ghost that’s in the woods, Robert, it’s _me_ , and you have every right to be fucking petrified.”

Robert doesn’t speak, doesn’t move. Just listens, lets me talk until all I can do is stand there on quaking knees, holding myself in the dim light between the bathroom and bedroom, balmy air rapidly losing its warmth.

“I got a right to own a gun, too,” Robert says after a pause. “That doesn’t mean I feel the need to have one.”

“Well, maybe you should. . . .”

“Am I going to need to, John?”

The return of my own words bites me in the stomach.

_“Are you going to run, now?”_

_“Am I going to need to, Robert?”_

I feel like I might be sick.

“Don’t patronize me,” I bite through clenched teeth, barely any sound to it at all, eyes downturned and fighting back the sting of moisture in them.

“I’m not,” he murmurs, gently reassuring, gruff but also sensual in its own way. The humidity that clings to my skin is cooling swiftly, causing goosebumps to rise on my arms beneath the heavy drape of his jacket, and I take comfort in the thought that’s probably what’s making me shake. The chill. Not the topic. “You say all these things, John, but you don’t mean them.”

My throat aches with its tightness. “And how do you know?”

“Just do.”

Then the distance is gone and his hands are slipping beneath the open panels of leather to previously claimed places on my sides, palms scoured smooth and damp. They’re strong, so much bigger than my own, and marked in little white lines from innumerable slips from who knows how many knives. They’re rough hands, as evident of his turbulent life as the perpetual hint of exhaustion in his eyes and the ever-faint suggestion of alcohol and smoke on his breath. But they aren’t rough, now. He’s gentle.

Everything about his posture and his hold leaves me a way out, a clear view of a door that I can take any second, and he won’t follow. Won’t even question it. Part of me wants to take it, and it’s not a small part. Yet I feel myself leaning into him, skin jumping at each delicate graze of warm fingertips, how his thumbs glide in circles just beneath my lowest rib and refrain from drifting anywhere inappropriate.

“I believe you, John.” He says it so quietly, warm breath against my temple.

I tremble, eyes misting over. He believes it. I want to throw up.

“I’m a monster to you. . . .” I choke on the word.

 _“No.”_ He’s not tame about it. He squeezes me with his hands and a wave of warmth like a candle flame flutters up my back, between my shoulder blades on fragile wings, and seeps under my heart like molten wax. “The other things. That you’re just a father doing his best to raise his daughter—his human daughter. You’re just a guy who’s had a harder life than he lets on. Who goes to the softball games his college buddy coaches and thinks whittling is an old man’s hobby and takes his kid to concerts he’s way too old for. Just some schmuck guy like the rest of us who’s lost some things, found some things, been shot at and chased by idiots with guns too big for their brains, and plays fuckin’ croquet with Bigfoot on weekends.”

I can’t help it. I huff a single, shaky exhale, and the tears are still there, but I can finally smile. Feel myself leaning into him.

“I don’t actually play croquet with Bigfoot, Robert.”

“Jesus, let a guy fantasize, will ya?”

I snerk, and just like that I’m laughing. It’s small and maybe a bit strained, but it’s real and it feels so good, feels right. One troublesome tear manages to squeeze free when his arm loops around my back and pulls me into his chest, a coarse, scarred thumb swabbing my cheek until the moisture is gone.

Robert whispers against my cheek, “You haven’t given me a reason to be afraid of you. Not really, John. Please, don’t try now.”

I let my breath out slow, the quiver of my spine departing alongside the exhale, and I hum softly to further push off the squall of anxiety until it’s little more than a troublesome gust in the background.

My mind is made up, and I figure I can just chalk another tally onto my new and extensive _Board of Dad’s Terrible Decisions_ later.

“Okay. I’ll show you,” I murmur, wondering at what point my hands found their way to his chest, thumbing the jagged line of the scar that creases diagonally across his pecks, wanting to ask, to know for sure, but filing it away with my long list of other Robert related curiosities. “But you should sit down, first.”

* * *

Robert sits calmly on the edge of the bed, watching without a word as I fidget like a grade-schooler delivering a speech in front of his entire peer group. We’re alone, but the watched feeling is no less prominent. He looks at me with eyes that are patient, a little tired, but utterly unhurried, yet my heart pounds like I’ve just come back from one of my runs.

Also, he’s freshly showered and naked and somehow that’s supposed to _help_? _Just picture your audience naked, that’ll make it easier._ Except it really doesn’t? And I’m naked, too, and still a little sticky in weird places. That doesn’t help, either.

“You wanted me to sit like you’re so worried you’re gonna knock me off my feet or somethin’,” Robert says. He’s chewing absently at his lip like he needs something in it, a cigarette maybe, but he’s doing it in a way that makes me wish it were my teeth worrying at that delicate flesh. But there’s no insistence in his voice when he speaks, just good-natured teasing. “Well, big guy, I’m waitin’.”

“You know, I can always sweep you off your feet, too,” I grin.

“Works for me.”

We both laugh, smiles lingering for a long time after.

I push a couple things out of the way, double check the curtains don’t have any gaps, and make sure I have space to not step on anything before working up the nerve to crouch on my heels in front of him, his jacket pulled like a protective shield around me. He’s seen a lot of me, but there are some things on my skin I’m not ready for him to ask about yet.

That’s when I notice it. The edge in his posture. A tick in how his thumb taps the inside of his knee, foot trying to bounce its way free of a rush of nervous energy before being quietly squashed down. I’m nervous, he’s nervous, but it’s for very different reasons. Or maybe not. Maybe it’s for the exact same reason, and somehow that makes it all the more disquieting.

I breathe.

Craig and I used to cliff jump when we were in college. It was always so easy for him to leap headlong from the edge no matter how high the drop, pierce the water like a hot blade through warm butter, just let the cold grip of deep water take him. His advice? _Just don’t think about it, bro._

So I don’t think about it when I start to change.

I could do it quick. Snap through the curling of muscle and shattering of bone in the blink of an eye, but Robert asked to see, so he’ll see it. Bones that begin to snap and splinter as they lengthen, twist, and realign into shapes not suited for a world where things don’t go bump in the night. How muscles whirl in on themselves and roll beneath my skin, black and gray fur rising up from my pores like foam in a turbulent sea. My nails darken, thicken, and curl as they grow, groaning softly as the bridge of my nose splits beneath the skin and elongates, square teeth extending into long, curved triangles, and my ears tingle as they flick and rise to sit vertically on either side of my head. Feet snap and stretch beneath me but I never lose my footing, tail swishing from my lower back to counter balance, and when I reopen my eyes there’s just enough time for the amber to finish bleeding through.

We’re the same height, now. Him still sitting and me still crouched, but I know implicitly that if I were to stand he would barely come up to mid-thigh on me.

And he’s gawking. There’s that. Gawking at a thing backlit by screaming truck headlights and it’s so close he could reach out and kick it, and it’s touching him, grabbing him, dragging him off the blacktop with his knife in its palm and there’s no way it isn’t going to kill him now, it merely spared the truck driver from a court hearing to take the pleasure for itself. How could he have been so dumb? Why didn’t he just run? All these years casually wandering backroads admiring views and enjoying the peace, leisurely looking for the unexplained in that he’s seen some weird things in his wanderings and sure as hell wants to see more, know more, but it’s never put him in danger like this before.

Because this isn’t a whiskey dream or a bear walking on its hind legs through overgrown brambles or a vague shape of something human dragging something behind it in the dark. This is _real_ and it’s sitting right in front of him, staring at him with amber eyes that jolt something primitive awake in his brain, something that harkens back to cave paintings and greenwood carved into crudely shaped spears, to when he might be a hunter, but he could just as easily be the prey.

I watch this tumble through his face without either of us budging, and it’s Robert’s turn to remember how to breathe. I slide the jacket off my back and drape it over the armchair next to me.

“Holy shit,” he mutters, hands bracing him upright against the abrupt weightlessness of all lingering doubts being unceremoniously hurdled out the window.

_“Kinda puts things into perspective, huh?”_

Robert nods vaguely, swallows. He sits forward, wrists hanging between his knees. For the first time, he sees me clearly. The bedroom isn’t at its brightest, but he sees me now. The direction the fur lays, how the definition of underlying muscle comes through. Thick thighs and haunches, shoulders broader than two of him, and arms and chest that, stretched out, look like they could capture a speeding train. And, yes, I do catch his subtle attempt to glimpse between my legs.

“Does it . . . hurt you to do that?” he asks slowly, eyes still not done drifting.

_“No.”_

“Jesus, it sounds like the end of the friggin’ world. Like it should be killing you.”

I cock my head. _“Undress in front of someone who’s never seen clothes before and they might think you’re ripping off your skin.”_

He takes a second to consider that, finds it agreeable.

Then something different pulls at the lids of his eyes, his brows, and I can almost see the gears turning where his gaze lingers just to the side of my face. In the voluminous plume of black fur around my head and neck, noticeably denser there than everywhere else. He gives me a “come here” gesture with the crook of his finger, and I decide not to be offended by being beckoned in such a way as I raise up to half my height and approach him. One step is all I need to loom above him, Robert’s eyes wide as he gapes for half a second, reigns it in as he leans back on his hands, and gazes up at a wolf’s head three times bigger than any wolf’s head should ever be. Full to the brim with fangs that could rip his throat out with the barest twitch of muscle.

So, when he reaches out, I hold perfectly still, failing at every attempt to keep relaxed, waiting for the sensation of fingers lacing, curling into my mane and what that’s going to do to me, but it doesn’t happen. He’s touching something so gently I can barely make it out, and I try to turn to see, but my head is too big and whatever it is it’s attached, and that’s when I realize he’s found one of Amanda’s braids.

As a toddler, Amanda learned that while daddy’s neck is big, his mane is what makes it that way, and things tend to stay when they’re stuck into it. While on outings or just playing in the yard she would spend hours combing the ground for things to put in it: flowers, leafy sprigs, cool rocks, oddly shaped twigs, the occasional feather, sometimes a beetle—much to my mortification and her utter amusement—or just use it to hold her color pencils while I napped on the couch and she got crafty on the floor beside me. As she got older, her fascination with my mane never waned, and to this day she still likes to doll it up, assuring me I look “majestic as all get-out” with locks braided. Fortunately, she hasn’t snuck beads or bows in for quite a while.

“Were these here before?” he asks, running his thumb down a long one that hangs just over my left shoulder.

_“No. Manda likes to braid it for me sometimes. She says it makes me look cool.”_

His lip twitches with a half smirk. “She’s right.”

I hum. Behind me, my tail swishes.

Robert drops the one braid, touches another, brow furrowed by the undoubtedly familiar sight of simple black hair ties keeping the locks together and how odd it must be to find something so mundane linked to something so completely not. He fiddles the braid in his fingers, twisting it, feeling its weight, the texture of the fur it contains, seems dissatisfied, and raises his eyes at me.

“No human bones?”

 _“Oh, I’ve got plenty. They’re powerful voodoo charms, you see. Made for me by an alligator witch in Louisiana after my first kill. I only wear them when I hunt to ensure the most glorious of bloodbaths,”_ I rumble, managing to somehow keep a straight face. _“Puka shells look nice, too.”_

Robert laughs.

_“You did say I was pretty. Maybe I should start dolling myself up more.”_

He smirks. Wrapping the braid around his fingers, he gives it a gentle tug; my eyelids flutter, tail swishes, and I follow the pull until I’m crouched above him, sheer proximity forcing him further back and into the middle of the bed, gently pulling, guiding me. The bed sags under my weight, groaning in laborious protest, but he holds my eyes inescapably. Like gravity. Like a comet hurdling through space, obliterating itself as it races headlong into the sun. Spectacular and violent and violently spectacular.

Robert doesn’t so much as shy from me.

He leans as he guides me, lowering himself to an elbow where I come to a stop, knees straddling his thighs, hands that are more like paws weigh down the bed over his shoulders. Looming over him in the shade of a gigantic shadow, blacker than void streaked with silvery gray.

He should be scared of me, I think, and maybe some part of him is—always will be on some primitive, survival-instinct sort of level—but for now he looks at me with the awe of a cave creature ascending the surface to witness its first sunrise. Because even though I twitch when his hand grazes my cheek, lip pulling at the accidental brush of sensitive whiskers, he stills but doesn’t draw away. He tries again, makes the right adjustments, and this time we’re both prepared for the delicate brush of his palm. Amber eyes flutter beneath heavy lids, breath shudders out of me, and I find myself leaning into him. 

“Fuck pretty,” he whispers. Dark eyes soft, puckered by his cheeks as he smiles, looking back and forth between shining yellow. “You’re gorgeous.”

A shiver laces down my spine, jolting my heart into a stammer, and settles in a heated pool low in my belly. Without having to think on it, I take his arm gingerly in my hand. He doesn’t resist. Robert has always been bigger than me, maybe just an inch or so in height, but there’s always been more substance to him, more form and definition. Like this, though, everything is flipped. He’s still the same in every sense, but he feels so much smaller. Not fragile or lesser. Everything about him is brighter, sharper, clearer—just smaller.

Instincts to protect this slight, precious thing rise in me, and I shiver with the want to defend, claim, please. The bigger impulses are easiest to withhold, but the smaller ones. . . .

Claws circle fully around his forearm, I press my face in his hand, nuzzling. My nostrils flare, breathing deep, flooding my senses with him. Earth, leather, smoke. Clean water, soap, shampoo. Like lilacs and sun on a cold day, warming the fur until all I want to do is fan out beneath it and bask in its heat, soaking it in. The hot, balmy gale of my breath puffs on his inner wrist; so near to the surface, I can smell the iron of his blood, heartbeat pulsing feverishly, unsoured by fear. Merely quiet awe as I pass my tongue across it, his tattoo, breathing him, tasting, touching him until he’s covered in my scent and there are so many more ways I want to cover him.

“John. . . .”

Robert’s voice snaps me out of it. He’s called me more than once by now, but only now do I notice the growing stiffness behind it. How his hand is twitching, trembling.

My eyes open, and Robert is gaping at me. Still no fear, yet his arm trembles in my grasp and anxiety twists its way into my belly. Until I breathe in and the thick perfume of arousal blasts a wide path into my lungs and brain. Suddenly all I can do is clench my fingers in the bedspread, clamp my jaw shut, and exhale for all I’m worth to stop myself falling into him, except it all culminates into a low groan and amber eyes fluttering closed.

 _“S-sorry, Robert, I—”_ I stammer, swallowing the taste of him, and a full-body shiver causes my fur to stand on end. I hang my head. Closer to him.

“’S okay, it’s fine,” he says, low and breathy.

He swallows, lowers his arm from my grasp, and collects himself. Heat colors his skin, and I bite my tongue behind my front teeth. He’s under me. I think it really clicks for us both at the same time, the kind of situation we’re in and how easily it could turn and become a whole lot more, maybe more than we can handle. How easily both wrists would fit in my hand, how my tongue would feel laving wet trails up his front, slicking his chest hair down, how it might feel for teeth to tenderly graze his shoulder or clamp delicately around his neck. How heavy I am like this, my shadow has a weight of its own, and it must be pushing down on him, enveloping him in ocean waves.

His hands find my wrists and follow them higher. His fingers that card through my fur, pushing against the grain before smoothing it down again. I shiver, eyes half-lidded. Rough hands on soft fur. Soft. That must be a word he never thought to associate with something like me. Something so huge and menacing. It might be laughable if not for the look in his eyes: captivated, enamored, nebulous. A shiver runs through me and settles in that hot pool still smoldering low, low in me where my cock pulses with interest.

When fingers intertwine with my mane, I can do little else but follow his pull, sinking to my elbows, and press my muzzle in the crook of his neck and shoulder. Without his head tilted I almost wouldn’t be able to fit, but I don’t care and neither does he. Robert’s fingers circle around the back of my head, rubbing circles into the base of my skull, beneath my ears, and I melt into him with a heady moan.

His name finds its way off the tip of my tongue, inhaling him in deep, hungry pulls. _“You shouldn’t—”_ I can’t finish it, not even the thought. I’m panting, now. Powerful shoulders rising and falling under his hands, stealing deep drags of scent.

“Shouldn’t what, John?” he asks, nosing into the smooth plain beneath my eye.

He knows. Has to. Has to know what he’s doing. Touches that are soft enough to tickle, making the fur stand on end as the skin beneath tightens, yet firm enough my muscles quake, and on my elbows and knees with rough hands combing through my mane I open my mouth against his shoulder and drag my tongue from the top of his pectoral to the crook of his neck, gathering up his taste in a long, wet stripe that rapidly begins to cool from the ambient air, tightening his skin.

Robert shudders.

“John. . . .”

 _“Touching me like this. You’re gonna. . . .”_ I trail off, nosing into his shoulder, his neck, his jaw. Covering him in my scent while eagerly soaking up his.

“Gonna what, John? Can’t read your mind. You gotta talk to me,” he says, all husky and low. Luxurious and smooth and beautiful as satin and very little idea as to the massive erection wedged under me and the bedsheets between his legs right now.

 _“I want to fuck you.”_ It comes out in a rush, claws stealing fistfuls of bedding as my ears fold back, pressing for more of his touch, his skin. _“Shit, just . . . touching you, you got me wanting you like mad, I . . . Robert. . . .”_

His hands go suddenly still, perched behind the knobby crest of bone at the back of my head. I start to whine, fearful of what that revelation must have just done, but all at once his hands dig for fistfuls of my mane and pulls and a hard shot of _yes, god, yes, please, more of that_ floods straight to my cock, drops my jaw to the floor with a sweet, strangled moan, and I grind my hips into the bed.

“Then what’re you waitin’ for?” Robert’s words are hot on my muzzle, tips his head back, and bares his throat at me.

The groan that comes out of me must sound in pain, but truly it’s anything but. I’m up on my knees in an instant, attacking his neck with licks and nips that are as playful as they are gentle and earnest. Once or twice my teeth graze with a little too much force, leaving marks behind, but if it hurts it isn’t enough for him to tell me to stop. Strong hands dig into my shoulders, centering us both as moans vibrate the taut skin of his neck, tickling my tongue, Adams apple bobbing when he swallows.

He’s rock hard against my belly, and another realization strikes me like a fist and I force myself up and off of him, kneeling back on my hocks. There’s a second where we’re both just there, panting wide-eyed at each other, then his gaze moves downward and he must come to the same conclusion I literally just did because a tiny bit of color leaves his face.

 _“I can’t. Robert, I can’t, not like this. Not right now,”_ I stammer, maw flexing with renewed tension, instinctually covering myself with hands on the bed between my knees.

He manages to sit up on his elbows, skin flushed red and adorned in a thin layer of sweat and, oh, wow, he has abs. A lot of them.

“Why not?” he asks. Not frustrated or annoyed. 

The door is still there. Has been all night and will always be there, fully open. For both of us.

I whine softly while self-consciously covering what I can; he doesn’t cover himself. Is he really going to make me—? _Can’t read your mind. You gotta talk to me._ Of course he is. He says nothing, but it’s there. He wants to understand. He won’t push, but he wants to.

“Do you want to stop?”

 _I shake my head. “I want you. I want you and I want to—”_ I hesitate; he gets the idea. _“I want to make you feel good, Robert. Want to see you come again.”_

His eyes darken just a little, drifting down to the dark, fleshy outline concealed by my forearms.

_“But I don’t want to hurt you.”_

“So don’t fuck me then,” he says. Like it’s the simplest, most obvious thing he would ever need to suggest. At my thunderstruck gawp, he goes on, “Get creative with it. You don’t have to fuck me right out of the starting gate. I ain’t shy. We can work up to that.” 

_Work up to it,_ he says. Like a repeat is guaranteed. Because this—all of it—it’s _real_. I don’t think I’ll ever get past that part.

“The hardest part’s getting me to blush.”

My tail starts to thump a beat on the bed.

Shoulders rolling forward, I raise up just a bit, just enough to loom, making a cautious move towards him that brings his smirk back to full clarity. Clawed hands press craters into the mattress on either side of his waist, and there’s nothing tentative or anxious about the way he looks at me, now. Not with his cock standing tall and keenly interested.

I rumble a sound from deep in my thick chest. _“That a challenge, Small? I should warn you, I know fifty-seven different ways to skin a human, and no shortage of ways to **bend** them. You think I can’t make your skin blush?”_ I lean in close until our noses nearly touch and purr when he gives me the sweetest show of teeth I’ve ever seen. _“Baby, I’ll make your heart **rush**.”_

I fall onto him like a lion on a gazelle, all tongue and claws, grasping, tugging, licking. With my thumbs on his upper ribs, the tips of my claws graze his back, scratching at him until he’s wriggling and struggling not to giggle, but I don’t intend to keep that up. A playful growl quakes the air beneath his sonorous laugh, and I haul him higher up the bed to give him something more comfortable to lie on. Haloed by a red pillowcase, I can’t help but appreciate just how much red really suits him. I drag my tongue up his chest, covering him in heated, balmy gusts while strong hands dig for handholds in my mane. 

I could do this all night. Just cover him in kisses while he holds onto me with irreverent curses slipping out between breaths. Hear his heart thunder behind his ribcage, savor the potent taste of sweat and arousal as it shudders up through his skin. The smell it thick on him like cologne, and I lick and nip my way down his chest, tease the length of his scar, his nipples, dragging the flat of my tongue over one, grazing it with teeth while toying the other pebbled and hard with a claw. He shakes beneath me in the best way—the way that isn’t remotely scared—hard breaths leaving him in tight, strenuous moans, perked ears funneling in his sounds.

“Shit. . . . _Oh_ shit, John, that’s good. Oh, fuck, _yes_. . . .”

Robert pants, head tipped back only to rock forward, relinquishing his grip on me as I descend, tongue following the trail of dark hair down his shuddering abdomen, muscles tightly bunched into neat, toned sections—Christ, his abs are like marble—and growl heatedly, a sound dripping with desire. His hips jump with each tender bite, never enough to damage the skin, but _whooo, boy_ is it tough to protest when his hands push at my head, urging me lower.

I don’t hesitate. If it’s where he wants me, I’ll happily oblige.

I give his shaft a playful little bump, gusting him with hot breath, and savor the view of his neck dropping back and thighs going suddenly stiff as they fall apart, flexing like he wants to pull them up, but I hold them down.

 _“Can’t read your mind, Small,”_ I rumble, nuzzling the side of his cock. _“Gotta tell me what you want.”_

He tells me clearly, and it all comes out in an obscene rush, tone thick as honey and arm slung over his eyes. “Christ— _fuck_ , John— _suck my dick!_ I don’t care how you do it—suck me, lick me, fuckin’ _bite me_ —just use your mouth on me, you beautiful fuckin’ creature!”

Welp, that sure doesn’t require translation. For a split second, I almost go with the shy impulse to laugh from the shock of it. I can practically feel to instant when my eyes darken, salivating buckets onto my tongue.

Cupping the backs of his knees, I push his legs up over my shoulders, and lick his cock like a melty ice cream cone. I know how to do this. Have done it before, but the desperation in his voice makes me want to be messy. Nothing sweet or slow about it, I lap and nuzzle him, drops of precome smearing the thin velvet on the top ridge of my muzzle, and drag the flat of my tongue over his tip, collecting musky, clear fluid before darting my tongue back into my mouth and up his length again.

All of this, he watches. Eyes nearly shut, mouth open, fisting brutal handfuls of sheet, and a faint hint of blood coloring his cheeks.

Red is definitely his color.

I’m not gentle, not slow, but don’t try to make him come, either. Not yet. I play with him, make that obscenely clear in the playful bumps and nuzzles, sweet little licks, and a tail that is most definitely wagging. Holding him in my mouth, my warm, wet nose buried in his pubic hair, rocking my head back and forth while mindful of my teeth, tonguing his dick remorselessly against the roof of my mouth, and growl animally when his quavering thighs press on the sides of my head. Pushing his hips into the bed, I keep him still with a heavy, growling moan. I may not have the dexterity of human lips, but he doesn’t seem to mind.

By time I pull off of him, Robert is arched back with a shine of sweat on his skin likes streaks of glittering diamond, tousled to the core. In his grasping he’s managed to pull up the sheet corners, hands partially buried in mismatched white and red blankets with one of mine cementing him to the bed. One black paw flat against his abdomen, the heel of my palm skirts the edge of his pubic area while the ends of my claws graze just below his chest.

He looks at me, tension thick in hazy, dark eyes; he’s so close to coming it must be torture to stop now. I can taste it on him, almost feel guilty. Almost.

 _“Not yet,”_ I rumble gravelly, licking my lips as I rise more fully onto my knees, erection bobbing between us, stroked near raw from touching myself while licking him. His heels fall on either side of me, chest heaving. _“Where do you keep your lube?”_

It takes a second before his focus leaves my aching cock long enough to answer, indicates a drawer in the bedside table, and I come back with a nice bottle of high quality water-based lubricant. I waste no time rubbing a copious amount onto my length, letting out a long, low moan. He watches me, eyes affixed to the view of a werewolf jerking himself off between his legs, and I can’t resist a toothy smirk at a wonder if this satisfies some fantasy of his.

Sure as fuck does for me.

I force myself to stop after a few pulls; much as I want to come, I’m not quite selfish enough to do it before he gets his. Rather, I run my clean hand along Robert’s leg, drawing his attention back, and plant a crisp smack to his inner thigh. He jumps, curses, and treats me to a view of his dick swaying as I rub wet circles into his thigh.

“Ass,” he smirks, rising onto his elbows to watch.

I purr a dark little chuckle.

I add more lube to my hand and do the same to the opposite leg, lathering back and forth until they feel evenly slick, the watery shine melting slightly and dripping down his thighs to stain the sheets beneath his ass. 

“What’re you up to?” Robert asks, eyes keen to everything my hands are doing, especially when I take the remaining lube on my palm and swipe it down his cock in a few long, firm strokes, mindful of my claws. “Fuckin’— _shit_!”

 _“I can’t fuck you properly right now, but with thighs like these maybe we can both get a taste,”_ I explain, licking the remaining slick from my fingers. It tastes like water that’s been sitting in a plastic cup for too long.

He figures out quick what I mean to do. Taking his knees in my hands, I give him time to shift into a more comfortable position while pressing them together and hold them up straight, both heels rested on my shoulder, and spread my knees wide to sit as low as possible. My cock head nudges the back of his thigh making him twitch, shudder, and a smile spreads wide over his face.

“Now that’s gettin’ creative,” Robert praises, pink tongue peeking from the corner of his mouth in a subtle lick as I use my free hand to line up, pushing into the well-lubed crease of his thighs.

A sigh leaves me when I get it, arm gripped tight around his legs, and Robert shivers right along with me as the low, low set of my knees drags my cock over his. The contrast is astounding. Bulging, thick, veiny, and an angry red color, my cock looks nothing like his, but it certainly isn’t a doggy dick, either. I dwarf him by a significant margin, and the flex of his thighs gripped around me is nearly enough to undo me on the spot.

“Fuckin’ hell, John,” he pants, ever the sweet-talker, “you weren’t kiddin’. Christ, you’re a big’un.”

I purr appreciatively, flattered, and swab my teeth with my tongue as I roll my hips back, slide forward, and moan at the sweet jittering of heat that caresses my spine. Cocks grinding together through the hot slick between his thighs.

_“Think you could handle it one day?”_

Robert reaches down, strokes the tapered head of my cock in slow, tight circles, and smirks when all I can manage is a swift buck forward and an eager little whine. “Oh, fuck, _yes_.”

My head tips back, nose to the ceiling as I let out a musical trill of gratitude towards the heavens and whomever is listening to have allowed this to happen, grip his thighs tight together, and fuck him up the bed. Thank god there’s space between the houses, because the knocking the bedframe makes on the wall is the furthest thing from quiet. My thrusts aren’t gentle. The weight of me alone is probably skirting the limit of what the bedframe is built to handle, but that thought is so far out of mind it may as well be in orbit.

Robert’s mouth hangs agape, head tipped back as his chest rises and falls rapidly, fingers digging into the pillows. He arches, curses, pushes his hips up and curls his feet on my shoulder. It’s divine. It isn’t perfect, isn’t what I want—what either of us really wants—but it’s close and it’s so fucking _good_. Beneath me like this, the slick glide of my cock between his thighs, pulsing, rubbing, butting, and grinding into his dick, my tongue lolls between canine teeth, dribbling onto his middle just above the messy patch of precome our cocks leave smeared on his lower stomach. 

Biting his lower lip, puffy and swollen, Robert runs his fingers through the mess, collecting it as I watch him rub it between his fingertips, on his palm, and reach between us. When he touches me, I jump a little. Jump and whine and thrust harder, pushing deeper into his thighs to get closer to that touch. He does it again, less tenuous this time, and smooths his fingers along my length, pulsing and hot, lube-slick and a perpetual bead of precome smearing onto his dick and lower abdomen. He touches me, squeezes his hand around the girth that sticks through his thighs, but his fingers can’t meet on the other side. He shivers, eyes dark, and strokes and tugs my cock in tune with my thrusts.

 _“Oh shit . . . oh shit, Robert—shit, just—just like that. Fuck, I—”_ I grumble thickly, pulling my tongue in as I gnash my teeth. Ears lie flat on the top of my head, heat pulsing up in my belly. 

He tweaks the head of my cock in his thumb and forefinger, rolling his palm over my length as I buck harder, deeper to get closer to him. His other hand slips beneath my shaft, tugging and jerking roughly at himself as he lays his head back. His neck and chest shine with sweat.

Oh, that simply just will not do. 

I casually bat his hand away, slowing a bit though not stopping, but he’s been to thoroughly thigh fucked at this point he doesn’t put up any resistance. Not when both of his are immediately replaced by one three times their size. Holding him with my palm to spare him the careless brush of claws, I grip us tight, trilling a return to the sweet, strangled gasp that cuts out his moan. Gripped tightly together, I jerk us both in long, fast tugs while humping his thighs. No way getting around that one; it’s the animal in me. Hips colliding with the backs of his thighs push him up the bed, bedframe striking a rhythm of lewd _thunks_ into the wall as Robert moans, tries to buck, and clenches the muscles in his thighs tighter.

He’s close. So close I can taste it on him. Thick, metallic, musky-sweet aroma like at the peak of rut. I’m not far behind, amber eyes gazing into him like spotlights. At sweat pooling in the hollow of his naked throat, skin painted with a deep red flush.

I moan. _“That’s it. . . . C’mon, Robert. Let me see you come, big guy. . . . Fuck, you’re so beautiful like this.”_

More words than that come through, but little makes it into my ears over the sound of our pleasure. Gasps and groans, growls and whines, and I have no idea who is making what noises and I don’t care. His cock grinds under mine as I thrust, jerking us together, easing his legs lower to one side, and attack his chest in eager licks.

Robert sobs, fisting rough handfuls of my mane as he curls in towards me. His brow is pushed up against the top of my head. I push back, breathing thick gusts of steam through an open maw, and in another few jerks he comes in my hand and drops stunned into the pillows. I fall not long behind him, thrusting and jerking in uneven strokes until every muscle tightens all at once, the heat and tension flooding out of me in a euphoric rush and spine curling _snarl_. Come spills across his chest and abdomen in thick spurts, pressing my weight into the backs of his thighs in an instinctual ploy to get as much of it as deep into him as possible; I’m heavy and it can’t be comfortable but my body locks, and all I can do is sit there half curled over him, trembling, breathing, and letting the last few quakes pass through me from the crown of my head to the tip of my tail.

I put his legs down carefully, giving each a tentative stretch to stave off any cramps I may have caused, and once he’s laid out more comfortably I begin the process of licking him clean. Robert inhales sharply, though not quite a gasp, and uncurls his shaking hands from my mane. Watches, I imagine, my tongue pass along the mess painting his abdomen, collecting and clearing and swallowing it all away.

Robert shivers, groans, breathes rough and shallow. “Fuck . . . John. . . .”

I hum wordlessly, nostrils soaking in the thick, heady musk of sweat, sex, and come that absolutely drenches him.

“That . . . happened,” he pants, the ruggedness of his tone exacerbated by a residual hoarseness. 

Lifting my gaze, he rests heavily on the pillows, head back, arm slung over his eyes, breathing hard. It’s a view to savor, and I take my time committing it to memory. 

I purr. _“It did.”_

Robert’s arm shifts. Just enough to peek over it to see me still there, still massive, fanged and crouching predatory over him, passing my tongue up his front like a lion licks the blood from its kill. Gathering up sweat, saliva, and the bitter, salty-sweet musk of come in long, hungry drags.

The way he smiles at me—full of awe, a little disbelief, and no small amount of lingering desire—with skin pliant with sexual satisfaction, I clean my lips and crawl on all fours up the bed to playfully lick his neck and chin. He laughs at me, pushing at my face with no real force or annoyance behind it.

 _“That happened,”_ I repeat back to him, pressing my muzzle gently into the side of his face, soaking up the scent of his hair like a dry sponge.

“’S it gonna happen again?”

I smile.

_“If all goes according to plan.”_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry this post is a bit late, but work and personal matters are taking up a lot of my time. My update schedule will probably be non-existent for a while, but rest assured updates _will_ continue as frequently as I can manage.
> 
> Thank you a thousand times over for all your wonderful love and support. I honestly could not do all of this without you blessed people. The Dream Daddy fandom seems to be quieting down and that kind of makes me sad, but this fic will continue to go strong for as long as I draw breath. I love you guys! <3
> 
> Additionally, if anyone wants to do fanart or anything of this fic you have my 10000% consent and approval. Make that beautiful stuff, just please for the love of god let me know because I ABSOLUTELY WANT TO SEE IT PLZ


	13. Good Moon

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The night is young, the air is sweet. With you at my side, I feel like I could conquer the world.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> For any who haven't seen it, John's profile has been overhauled and now features a better picture and some cute synopses of his character! Click [here](http://crescentmoondemon.tumblr.com/post/165566760598#notes) to see it!
> 
> Here is the link to the [Terminology Master Post](http://crescentmoondemon.tumblr.com/post/165422480878#notes) which is updated each time new cyptid info comes to light.
> 
> * * *
> 
> **Please see my profile page for an important update on the future of this fic and my presence on AO3. It is not good news, but with your help that can change.**

> _Robert: john_  
>  _Robert: hey_  
>  _Robert: wyd tonite_
> 
> _John: Sleeping. What’s up?_
> 
> _Robert: that’s no fun_  
>  _Robert: wanna hang?_
> 
> _John: Heck yeah I do_
> 
> _Robert: good. come over my place @ 9_  
>  _Robert: got a surprise_

* * *

Amanda knows I’ll be out with Robert tonight, maybe leaving out the fact that it’ll be at his place. Despite my ever increasing protests as a father, she isn’t a kid anymore, and I don’t actually want to gross her out with thoughts of her dear old dad doing grown up things with our hotter-than-Hades neighbor—like having drinks, sneaking into movies, going on late night drives, playing with knives, and eating fruity pizza. That would only inspire her to grow up faster. I tell her not to wait up for me; I’ll have my phone if she needs me and will be back before morning. 

When the door opens to Robert’s place, he’s standing there sans leather jacket. A pleased half smile on his face with one arm propped on the doorframe and the other hooked on his belt. The circles under his eyes are slightly less dark tonight. He looks suspiciously like he just woke up, and I not a single part of me would be surprised if that were the case.

I present him with a smile and a bottle of Cherry Zinfandel, and he lets me inside.

Tiny claws skitter across the floor as a white and black blur careens headlong into my shins, nearly knocking me off my feet while yapping excitedly. I can’t help laughing as I crouch down and give Betsy my hand to smell. Her tail wags up a cyclone while Robert watches.

“Good to see you again, too, girly,” I giggle, petting her head as she stands on her back feet to paw at my knees and demand scratches.

Robert takes the bottle as he moves to the middle of the room, and I’m halfway through removing my shoes when I see how things have been rearranged. Every time I’ve seen the inside of Robert’s home it’s been cluttered, so I almost didn’t notice the change. One of the couches and the coffee table have been moved against the far wall opening up a large space in the center of the living room, most of the empty bottles have been picked up, and the remaining couch is positioned away from and facing the flat screen TV, cushions from the other couch made up in front of it like floor seating.

“Nothing good playing at the theater right now. Figured we could stay in and have some fun,” Robert offers as Betsy darts off someplace.

A new smile has already split across my face. I can’t help it when I say, “Man after my own heart. Careful I don’t go nose-first into the popcorn bowl.”

He chuckles. “You say that like you were raised by wolves or somethin’.”

My face skews up in a valiantly effort not to burst out into side-splitting laughter. But a snerk slips free and I fall into a fit anyway, and Robert is just so dang pleased by that.

He sets the wine beside the couch as I come over, and he pats the top of a stack of mismatched DVDs and VHSs—wow, haven’t seen any of those in a while—piled on the coffee table.

“Take your pick. I still got questions,” Robert says cryptically.

I quirk an eyebrow at him, but he gives me no hints as he passes me bound for the kitchen. Only rather than pass right by he hooks one of my belt loops and gives it a sharp but playful tug, enough to give me a jolt. It’s clear he meant nothing more than to get a rise out of me, but something impulsive flashes in my brain. I whirl into the spin, grab his shoulder (succeed in not punching him in the chin), and yank him to me. Robert has enough time to look stunned before my other hand is behind his head and pulls him into a fiery kiss.

He doesn’t miss a beat. Grabs me by the waist and shoves me into the wall. Breath leaves me in a rush of hands, lips, and teeth. His body presses up against mine, not leaving an inch unclaimed. One of his knees pushes between my thighs, his tongue sliding along mine.

It’s a while before we can bring ourselves back. I break from him slow, eyelids heavy and bite-reddened lips parted for breath. His thumb traces the edge of my jaw as I extricate my fingers from his hair.

“Wow,” I mutter hoarsely, unable to take my eyes off his lips. They’re wet from my tongue and there’s a red mark where I vaguely recall biting down.

Robert smirks, presses a final kiss into the corner of my mouth, and walks on to the kitchen, fingers lingering on mine to the very last.

Once the world has ceased spinning, I leave my jacket on the back of the couch and inspect the roster of tonight’s potential candidates. Picking them up and setting them down one at a time, I assess titles.

_Van Helsing._

_Bad Moon._

_The Howling._

_An American Were—_

I blink, lean back to see at all the titles at once, and don’t bother to hold in my grin.

“Werewolf movies?” I question his motives with a _look_ from across the room, but Robert is expertly positioned behind an open cabinet conveniently high enough to cover his face.

He rifles around, shoulders clearly bobbing, and produces a box of microwavable super-extra-mega-butter popcorn before shutting it.

Robert shrugs casually. “Thought maybe I could do a bit of research. Got some opinions from a credible enough source, but it never hurts to expand the horizons.”

I shake my head and hold up a battered VHS copy of _Teen Wolf_. “Yes, because Hollywood has always been such a credible source. Hey, I get it. It’s all about subtext. The Wolf is just a metaphor for teenagers releasing the pent-up urges they face growing up in a world where archaic puritanical views tell them sexuality is bad. That it’s evil and letting it out can make you lose all your friends and join the wrong crowd.”

He half folds his arms across his chest, box still in hand, and cocks his head and eyebrows at me. “When was the last time you saw _Teen Wolf_?”

“It’s been a while.”

Robert throws his head back with a short but echoing laugh. “No kiddin’!” He puts the first bag in the microwave and sets it to start popping. “ _Or_ —and this is just a crazy idea, but hear me out—you could rate them on accuracy. Y’know, so I have a better idea of what to look out for in my day-to-day cryptid related escapades.”

“Ah, yes. Because Maple Bay is absolutely brimming with varúlfur.”

He smirks. “I was thinking on a scale of One to Shut-the-Blinds-Someone’s-Watching. Appearance, transformation sequences, triggers, and the always important gore factor. You know, the basics.”

Ah, yes, the most important factor in the werewolf genre. 

I wave the padded plastic VHS case at him. “Sorry to burst your cryptid bubble, big guy, but none of them are accurate. Trust me. Except maybe _Van Helsing_ —that one I give credit for at least making werewolves monstrous _and_ sexy.”

Cheap, salty, butter-y goodness fills the room while the popcorn finishes popping, and Betsy stares up at her master with giant, pleading eyes. All he has to do is say “no” and she scurries off to play with one of her toys instead. Robert pours the steaming bag into a bowl and tosses a second bag in.

“Monster make-up captures the monstrous side so well, but never the other side, huh?” Robert hums. 

“You’ve seen what I really look like, Robert. You know how the transformation goes. And there aren’t triggers; I can change whenever I want. No full moon necessary.”

“That just leaves the Gore Factor, then. How does that go, exactly? How do—what was that word—varoolver . . . ?”

“Varúlfur.”

“Yeah, that. How does one of you actually hunt? You said you hunt game. Are you more ambush or chase-it-until-it-drops hunters?”

I think on it a second, mind growing cloudy thanks to the increasingly potent salty-savory smell making my mouth water. “Well, like I said, I prefer my meat cooked, but it’s all in individual preference. Those times I bumped into you, I was out for a run. That’s what Amanda and I call it. I get this urge to just be out there. In the woods with the wind in my fur, running for all I’m worth. It’s nice. I kinda hunt while I do. I chase things. Not to eat or kill, but just for the sake of the chase, you know? As for other varúlfur, I don’t know, I guess it’s a matter of personal preference. One of my cousins swears by raw raccoon. I always thought it tasted like burnt hair.”

I don’t realize it until then that Robert is staring at me, not appalled or even surprised, but like a student listens to a teacher talk about something that isn’t going to be on the test but is just genuinely interesting. I rub the back of my neck and blush.

“And about the transformation,” he continues, pouring out the second bag and beginning on the third. “Where do your clothes go?”

A bemused, crooked smile twists one corner of my mouth. I can’t help but laugh a little, blown away by the unexpectedness of that question. _“What?”_

“Do you rip out of them Incredible Hulk style or does something else happen?”

Oh, now this is a good topic. I clap and rub my hands together mentally, swelling with anticipation to blow his freaking mind.

“Something else.” 

“Yeah?”

With both hands, I gesture to all of me. Feet and knees and hands and a chest that is not so thick it looks like it could probably catch an out of control bus. “Where do you think this goes when I change?”

Robert hesitates, looking me over critically before offering up a tentative and slightly bewildered, “Underneath . . . ?”

Cue finger guns. “Bingo! Well, sort of.”

“And how the hell does _that_ work?”

I offer up my most ostentatious wink. “Magic.”

His eyes blow wide. _“Really?”_

“Oh, yeah. I usually undress before a run on principle; it feels more natural that way, more freeing, but I don’t actually need to. Clothes kind of just melt underneath it all, and everything’s still in the same place when I change back.”

“What about what’s in your pockets?”

“Actually, that stuff isn’t technically part of your clothes, so it falls out. Magic is funny that way. Changing into a human is the one thing all varúlfur can do, but we’re not terribly good at much else. One-trick ponies, the lot of us. Not to say some can’t do more, but a lot of that has been lost, and it’s hard as hell to learn.”

Robert looks confused, taking it all in the best that he can, but he nods like he understands even though he really doesn’t. 

“It’s a long story,” I apologize, rubbing the back of my head. “Suffice to say The Spanish Inquisition was not a good time for anyone. But back to the Gore Factor.” I slip a DVD case from near the bottom of the pile, a black cover with gooey red lettering, and hold it up with an ear-to-ear grin. “ _Dog Soldiers_ is a time-honored tradition; I could probably quote this bad boy word for word.”

Robert’s smirk is broad, toothy, and incredibly satisfied. “ _Dog Soldiers_ it is.”

* * *

Yeah, flat-screen LED is the only way to watch gratuitous violence, and surround sound never made obscene British swearing sound so good. Betsy is utterly unbothered by the screams and gunfire while she naps on a small pile of dirty clothes nearby.

I dig into the popcorn bowl for a handful of savory pieces, popping a few into my mouth as soldiers start dropping in spectacularly gory fashion while running through the woods only stopping to lay down cover fire and scream at each other. Sitting beside me on his own cushion, the bowl of popcorn between us, Robert points at the screen with one finger while the other four stay wrapped around the neck of the Zinfandel bottle.

“Night vision?” he asks.

“Yep, though it’s not in grayscale.” I pick at a piece of popcorn skin I can feel wedged between two molars and thank the powers that be when it comes out. “I can see in all the same colors as in the daytime, just a little muted. Visibility is best under a full moon, which is probably where the legend comes from. We’re more likely to be active then, and it’s easier to see us, too.”

Robert nods. “Pack hunting?”

“Pack _living_. No need to hunt when you can pick up a rack of lamb at the grocery store. Dynamics are pretty much the same as any family.” I hold my hand out. He passes me the bottle, and I take a swig of sweet cherry. Man, that’s refreshing. “No such thing as true alphas or omegas, either. ‘S always one person people gravitate to as a leader, but it isn’t formal. Packs are mainly close family members like parents and their kids, sometimes aunts, uncles, cousins, and grandkids, so the leader usually winds up being a parent. Individuals split off all the time to form their own packs.”

“That what you did?”

I smile shyly, remembering my father’s look of cold stoicism the day I brought a human home. A human who _knew_ , who’d seen. Mom was supportive, saw it as proof the world was changing, that we didn’t need to hide. Dad didn’t see it that way. He only saw the risk, the danger I put us in. How cold his eyes were while mom hugged us, and I squeezed Alex’s hand like the lifeline he was to me back then.

“Yeah,” I say and take another swig.

The camera shows a grayscale view of the woods through the perspective of whatever mysterious beasts are hunting the soldiers. As they run for their lives, dragging their wounded, they fire wildly off-screen. Occasionally a distorted yelp, snarl, or howl will burst out following a hail of gunfire to signal one of the creatures has been injured, yet it pauses only momentarily before resuming the chase. 

Robert snacks on a few bits before posing his next question, “Regeneration is a thing, though?”

“Accelerated healing, yeah, but I wouldn’t call it regeneration. I lose an arm, it stays lost, and most critters don’t survive getting hit by a train.” I wipe my greasy hand on my pant leg and turn it over, showing him the scar down my palm now familiar to both of us. “If the injury is bad enough, it leaves a scar regardless of how fast it heals.”

He looks thoughtfully at the mark, sliding callous fingers around my wrist to better position it for inspection. His fingers, too, are marked with countless pale nicks he has no idea I’ve mentally mapped out. Robert has to know I’ve noticed he no longer wears the steri strips on his thumb. It’s nearly healed, and the white halo of young skin along its edges reveals a new scar in its earliest stages.

The movie progresses until the soldiers make it to a farmhouse and hunker down, surrounded by what they have rapidly begun to realize are no ordinary animals.

“What about living in dens?” he asks.

I give him a flat look. “Does my house look like a hole in the ground to you?”

He snerks. “Dunno, never seen the inside.”

I’ll have to remedy that. Soon. “Well, it isn’t. I grew up in a house.”

“An _underground_ house?”

“Oh, absolutely. You see, we had a stylish dirt floor that matched the ceiling, dirt furniture, kitchen utensils, appliances, even the bedsheets and the shower—all dirt! Decorating was a breeze; all we had to do was etch things in with a stick. I’m tellin’ you, it’s versatile stuff!”

Robert laughs riotously. One of the soldiers gets wrenched through a window to a gory doom, but all I can think about is how incredible he looks when he smiles. I mean, sweet stars, put that on my headstone: _Killed by Robert Small’s smile._ Don’t even bother with a name. Just that for all eternity. 

“Always knew you liked it dirty,” he smirks, raises the lip of the Zinfandel bottle to his lips, but doesn’t drink. Licks a slow circle around the rim, tongue stained crimson from the wine, and dips the tip of his tongue into the narrow opening.

The sound I make is not elegant. Because my throat closes up and I nearly die on a piece of popcorn. Every millimeter of my skin flares a blazing red blush, and I splutter a wimpy, “gonna get some water,” before scurrying away. Robert practically rolls with laughter behind me.

When I do manage to recover enough of my mental and physical integrity to come back, I bring a glass of water for him, too, and plunk down in my spot like nothing happened. Even though he’s smiling as he drinks. Okay, more like grinning maniacally because the tips of my ears are still blushing like absolute hell and that must be freaking adorable to him.

“You’re terrible,” I say flatly. In no way am I letting on about how I needed to compose myself over the sink while a million fantastic images raced at Mach speed through my head. Namely about one of us bent over the couch arm, and there is definitely tongue involved.

“I am,” he agrees wholeheartedly.

* * *

Robert puts Betsy to bed around the time one soldier finishes stuffing another’s intestines back in.

The gore effects are marvelous, made all the better by the fact I’m actually invested in the soldiers’ struggles to stay alive. Which is why when they continue being picked off in glorious, gory fashion I almost feel bad for the part of me rooting for the opposite team.

“What about the chupacabra?” Robert asks seemingly from nowhere, unexpected enough I pause before feeding myself some obscenely over-buttered bits to look at him. “They real?”

“Uhh, I think so? Not entirely sure?” And I’m genuinely not. I think back on some rumors my mom heard from a friend who visited a family of mngwa recently emigrated from Tanzania to Puerto Rico. They were trying to keep chickens, but something kept killing them off at night; they thought maybe it was just a vampire being an asshole, but one of the cubs claimed to have seen a hopping, lizard-y creature with spines that wouldn’t talk to her. “Puerto Rican one might be real, but the Texan one is a load of crap.”

He hands over the wine bottle when I hold out my hand and doesn’t bat an eye when I polish it off. Just sits back more fully and waits for me to finish.

“How do you know?” he asks.

I explain the family friend story along with what a mngwa is, and a starry-eyed Robert gives me his undivided attention. “As for the one in Texas—one of my cousins got married to a girl with family out there. Long varúlfur lineage, big family. It’s literally a mutated dog-coyote cross, and mange is bad in the area so a lot of wildlife get it. It’s so anticlimactic. All these shows make a big to-do about dash camera footage and livestock mutilation, but a lot of things would love to eat the fleshy bits off a recently dead cow; that doesn’t mean it’s a goat sucker.” 

Setting the empty bottle aside, I lean back into the foot of the couch. At some point during the movie, I’ve sidled closer to him, and with his arm slung over the seat behind me the warmth chases off the slight chill invading the back of my neck. He’s not wearing his jacket, but I’m pretty sure the leather scent has bonded to his skin on a molecular level. I can’t help wanting more of it, and Robert is all too happy to indulge me.

“So only some goat suckers are real?” He shakes his head, tsk-ing disappointedly. “Shame.”

I erupt in sudden, wheezing laughter. Not truly finding it funny, but more blown away by the idea. That anyone would find it a shame there aren’t _more_ chupacabras, well, that’s a new one even for a fellow cryptid. “Nuh uh. Oh no. _Not_ shame. I may never have seen one myself, but in no uncertain terms do I want to keep as far away from those things as possible.”

Robert grins sideways. “Not very neighborly of you. Don’t cryptids have to stick together?”

“Sometimes, maybe, but not all cryptids get along, Robert.”

“Like you and Bigfoot?”

I nod. “Exactly like us and Bigfoot. I may be big, but I’m not the baddest cat in the woods.”

“What is?”

“ _That_ I hope to never find out.”

* * *

It starts somewhere after the part where the main asshole becomes a werewolf asshole. Gratuitous amounts of blood, gunfire, and British cusses are still going on, but I lay my head on his shoulder and Robert loops his arm around mine. With a confident tug, he pulls me in close. Fingertips trail the leading edge of my shoulder, following the line of my collarbone, and sending a shiver up through my spine when his fingertips slide up my neck to my chin. He pushes so carefully, and I already suspect what I’ll find as I raise my head.

I am not disappointed. Because he’s there. Looking at me with eyes half lidded, face angled just a hair to one side, leaning so close to me I can taste cherry on his breath. He looks at my lips like he wants to consume them.

“Hey,” I whisper under my breath, suddenly transfixed by the slight part to his lips. And how they subtly curve in a smile.

“Hey yourself,” he murmurs, gives me a playful nudge, and I fall into him.

The few times Robert has kissed me it’s been rough and so passionate it melted me from the core right down to wobbly knees, but this is neither of those. It’s light and airy, almost coy, and that steals my breath in so many unexpected ways. 

My lips move against his. Almost without realizing it, my hand takes hold of his shirt, gently clasping a handful of material. He hums. I shudder. Soft lips. Warm and wet, they give against mine. The world centers on that point. Softness and taste—popcorn and cherries. A tongue glides along my lips and is pulled into an eager dance. Someone laughs softly, me or him, it isn’t clear. But my head is swimming with him. Hands slide along soft red fabric and tangle handfuls of my shirt, separating into soft bites and nips, grasping and tugging, shifting to my knees, and strong fingers hook into my belt loops and pull me into his lap without hesitation. Straddling his thighs, Robert crushes me against him, breath puffing down my neck in hot waves.

His hand pushes up the edge of my shirt, callous fingers grazing my stomach, and a hard shiver laces white hot up my spine. Palpable enough I separate with a trembling sigh, his teeth and tongue worrying at my lower lip.

“The movie?” Robert asks gruffly, dark eyes smug on so many levels. The question is barely even in earnest. Not a single care in him about the soldiers formulating a way to survive the relentless slaughter, he’s just looking for confirmation.

He gets it in the form of a half smirked, “Screw the movie,” and fingers entwined with the back of his head. 

Stealing a small fistful of hair, I ply him with a gentle tug, and the way his eyelids flutter closed sends a nugget of molten _oh hell yes_ ping-ponging through my chest. Because I would never have pegged him for the type when we first met—rather, I would have thought he’d be the one delivering the rough treatment—but now that little detail fits like a perfect crimson bow atop my leather-clad gift from the stars.

Robert’s mouth falls open with a rough, husky moan which is swiftly captured by a kiss. I cup either side of his neck, thumbs grazing the edge of his jaw, and cant my hips into his unrelenting pull. He bites my lips; I suck on his tongue. His hands work at my belt, tugging and yanking as I slide my hands under his shirt, pushing at it insistently until he’s forced to break to pull it off. He yanks his hands free of the cuffs and tosses it inelegantly to the side. Something in me flares up hot and bright at the sight of him like this: all taut, dusky skin, broad shoulders, unkempt chest hair, the scar that runs diagonally, dips down, and ends low on the other side of his chest, and clearly defined pecks and abs that leave my mouth dripping wet.

He just sits back and gives me my moment to admire and maybe that’s a little on the narcissistic side but I don’t care because holy hell I need this view framed and mounted. Maybe Robert isn’t ripped like Craig, but he’s _toned_. Like a country mile crammed into a city block. Every ridge and valley where one muscle bleeds into the next, not thick or bulging, but endlessly rolling beneath my fingertips.

_“How?”_ I ask, every bit as awestruck as I feel. 

“A shit ton of yoga,” Robert says smugly.

Probably a million thoughts race circles in my head from him contorted in impossible ways to the utter impossibility of Robert-freaking-Small topless in tight pants bent in a downward dog and how that’s messing with my head, but there’s also a nagging something just under the surface about his gym bag on the floor and what I thought at second glance might have been a yoga mat leaned against his bedroom wall.

The thoughts are gone in a flash, not because I don’t care but because he finishes with my belt and squeezes my hips and every little move that causes his arms to flex makes me lick my lips. I descend on him like an attack, lips on his neck, teeth razing his shoulder, and Robert hisses spectacularly as his muscles go taut. I swallow, lips and tongue working at his skin, fingers curled around his arm and cradling the back of his neck. Sweet groans and rolling hips push into me, and Robert’s erection grinds between my thighs. The skin is red and angry when I leave it. Knowing it will only get darker makes me want to be especially devious, and when Robert tips his head back exposing more of his neckline all I can do to keep from bursting out of my skin is curl my fingers into his shoulder like claws and sink my teeth higher up his neck.

It’s enough just to be rough with him. To feel his pleasure bleeding off him in the tight grip on my hips, pulse thudding under my tongue, moans rough and breathy, and his hard-on grinding through our jeans.

It’s enough, but it’s not. Not nearly enough. Not when he unzips my fly and shoves his hand beneath the waistband of my boxers. The sound he squeezes out of me in sharp and strained. A hot, windy gasp, and suddenly he covers my mouth with his, stealing my lips, devouring my breath. The world flips in a whirl of clasping hands, and my back hits the cushions with an airy laugh. Robert smirks at me, hair ruffled and neckline red in places, hikes my leg higher over his side, kneads my cock in firm strokes, and descends on my neck with an assault of his own.

Strong hands push at the waistband of my jeans and boxers, pushing both down enough I kick through them the rest of the way, yank my socks off, grab him by either side of his face, and pull him into a heated, demanding kiss. My legs pretzel behind his back. Robert chuckles, his sounds turned all the more fiendish when I yank smartly on his belt, whip it free, and it clatters noisily wherever it gets thrown. That earns me a wicked smile, and he bites my lips red and raw until his jeans are off, too.

Boxers then socks come off, and his hand pushes under my shirt where fingertips graze a patch of raised, puckered skin beside my naval. My heartbeat flares when a shot of anxiety pierces the haze; his lips separate from mine. Robert flops onto his back from a sudden push, blinking back surprise when I come up straddling his thighs and hold him down to kiss him roughly.

Robert moans into my lips. A thick, heavy sound from deep in his chest as I roll my hips forward, rubbing our cocks together. He cups my waist. Fingertips bunch in the fabric of my shirt, grazing my hips and lower back as I work his tongue with my own. They slide up my spine, pushing hot shivers along the length as they go, and when they reach another patch of raised skin I don’t stop him this time. My heart pounds as the fabric collects over his wrists, fingertips finding any number of imperfections as they go. His mouth leaves mine long enough for the shirt to come off, and where I expect him to stop and stare he doesn’t. Strong, scarred hands cup my neck and pull me back into him, covering my lips with bone-quaking ferocity.

My apprehension is gone in a plume of pink smoke. My cock pulses as he fills my mouth with his tongue. I take his wrists, pin them on either side of his head, and kiss him so hard our teeth clash.

“Robert,” I moan into his lips, plying at them with light, tugging bites. He chases my lips even as they recede. “Lube. Now.”

He huffs, head falling back with a puckish smile.

“Need my hands for that.” He tongues the corner of his mouth breathlessly.

I give back his hands and allow him room to rifle through a drawer, uncap the bottle, and squirt a generous amount into my offered hand. Shifting farther up his thighs, I wrap my hand around his cock, squeeze gently, and his head drops back with a jaw-slackened sigh. I want to tease him. Stroke him slow until he squirms. Grip him hard, tease the head of his cock with my thumb, circle the slit until he drips precome on the cusp of an obscenely messy and delightful orgasm. But I don’t. Because I want him bad and I don’t want to wait.

Fingertips digging craters into the cushions, Robert watches with dim, hungry eyes as I clean my hand and slide further up his thighs, position him beneath me, and sink onto him. 

My lips fall open, two hands brace on his middle, and Robert groans thickly. The discomfort is fleeting, and once I’m fully seated his hands fly to my hips, gripping me tight while I roll experimentally. Chewing my bottom lip. Oh, yes. This is good.

Head tipped back, I let out a soft, breathy moan. On the TV screen, the werewolves have gotten into the house, and one of the characters confesses to having been a werewolf the whole time. Every word of the monologue plays in my head, getting a smirk from me as I gaze down at Robert’s enraptured, closed-eyes expression. Hands braced on his middle, I lean down to him, rolling my hips as he lifts his head, clutching my sides, kissing me with parted lips.

“’Being nice to me will get you killed,’” I whisper along with the character, a solemn, dramatic score rising in the background. One of the soldiers loads his last bullet into his pistol, a far-off look in his eyes.

Robert gazes up at me. Running his fingertips harshly down my thigh, four long welts are left where his fingernails graze my skin. I jerk, shudder, sigh, lift higher and fall back onto him. He gasps. Amber bleeds through into my eyes; he watches, fucking mesmerized.

“’I’m the real thing.’” It rumbles in his ear as a growl. 

Robert’s hand flies to cradle the back of my head. Kissing the side of my neck, his teeth raze my skin. I groan.

“That you fuckin’ are,” he moans, rolling his hips up to meet me. 

His hands are all over me as I ride him. Clutching my hips, my thighs, fingers curling around my sides so he can tug me into kiss after heated, breathy kiss. Popcorn and cherry wine are not a taste I ever thought could mix well, but on him it tastes like freaking _bliss_.

Sweat shines on his body, muscles curling as he holds onto me. Abdominal muscles flex, dark skin reddened with blood. Robert’s face is tight with pleasure, watching me with half lidded eyes. Lifting myself up and down on him, I can’t take my eyes off that ravenous look he’s giving me. Low, heavy breaths and gasps. Sweat slithers down my back, stomach tightening while a molten pool of pleasure widens deep in my belly.

“Shit, John,” he curses, clutching my calf as I rise up on one knee. Chest heaving in rapid breaths, “Fuck, that’s it. Just like that. . . .”

My lip stings from biting it so much. Nails dig thin, crescent shapes into his shoulders. Robert’s teeth clench with a hiss, tipping his head back, bucking his hips and pulling a cry of _oh god, Robert, yes_ from me. A strong hand slides behind my back, blunt nails scratching my shoulder blade with a stinging sweetness, tug at my side, pull me to meet him. Pushing up onto one arm, Robert kisses me. Hard. Lips mashed together, tender flesh pinched between scraping teeth, he crushes my body into his, sandwiching my cock between us. 

Strong arms loop around my back as mine encircle his neck, clasping onto him, riding him hard. Delirium spills thick and milky behind my eyes, the world blurring as we inhale each other’s breath. Robert grips my sides, digging at my back and the many scars like he means to add to them, but all thoughts fall to the wayside when he thrusts his hips. My head lolls back, mouth agape with a strangled cry of his name, fingers dug into his back holding on for all I’m worth. He cements his lips to the side of my neck, tonguing and biting me into a whimpering mess. He grips my cock in his fist, jerks me hard.

My skin burns with his heat. Sweat and bare skin and breath mingling. My legs squeeze behind his back as Robert grips my hips with enough force to bruise flushed skin, and stars flash behind my eyes when he _thrusts_. I come with a jolt, keening into the crook of his shoulder. Nails pull sharply across his shoulder blades; I come into his hand and against his lower stomach. He doesn’t let me go. Keeps thrusting, working me through it, his words lost to pounding ears even as his lips toy with the shell of my ear. 

He eases me onto my back, hand flying to brace on the couch, and buries his face into mine. Breathes me in with swift, deep pants, parted lips, heaving lungs, thrusting hips, and my fingers lace behind the back of his neck when he finally comes. Thick arms brace into the couch and at my side, my thighs, my lips, and comes with a low, heady groan, sinking into me, and shudders deep.

For a moment it’s enough to simply breathe. Face pressed into mine, stunned into trembling stillness, and when he sags into me I take his weight gladly. A tangle of hot, damp limbs. Chest to chest, my pulse thunders in my ears.

“You’re the real thing,” Robert whispers reverently. Fingers curled into my back, his lips press at the side of my neck, breathing me in.

I smile. “So are you.”

* * *

“Come cryptid hunting with me some time,” Robert says, fingers toying absently with the lower edge of my hip bone, arm wound loosely around my waist.

_Now there’s an idea,_ I chuckle to myself. Nestling closer in at his side, I tighten my arm a little more snuggly across his middle. God, his torso is like a Michelangelo statue.

The movie winds down with a tense, close quarters showdown in the basement between the last surviving soldier and werewolf.

“What is there to look for except me?” I raise my head to see him, and Robert is looking me up and down. All the places skin touches skin, and a few spots that missed being cleaned.

There is so much more than me in those woods; I wonder if Robert really knows that. If he’s really ever seen it.

“Plenty,” he says. His eyes linger where he thumbs a slow circle into my hip. I sigh; it feels so nice. “Been lookin’ for things long before you got into those woods.”

Gingerly, Robert slides his free hand across my brow and pushes away a few strands of hair. Warmth spreads across my face at the gesture and when his hand lingers on my face, thumb brushing the high edge of my cheek bone.

“Alright,” I agree with a smile, already leaning further into his touch. I hum softly, nuzzle my nose into the crook of his neck where a red mark is starting to show through the skin, and breathe him in. “But don’t think things are going to jump out at us just because I’m there.”

Robert grins, curls his thumb and forefinger on the tip of my chin, and lifts my face so that our noses come flush together. His lips are softly curved at the edges, dark eyes drinking in the sight of my smile so near to his.

“Wouldn’t dream of it,” Robert whispers.

I happily let myself fall into his lips all over again.

* * *

My phone going off with text messages is what wakes me. The flare of annoyance is excruciating, and I fumble for the thing plugged in on my bedside table just to flick the ringer off and silence it. Momentarily blinded by the screen glow, I wait for the auto focus to lessen my suffering before blearily inspecting the flurry of texts coming in. It’s 6:22am and I only got to sleep a few hours ago.

Who the heck is CryptidCutie—?

_Oh._

Chewing my lower lip, I recall finally giving Robert my number last night and drunkenly putting in his contact name as something ridiculous like that. Embarrassed at myself, I quickly change it over to something more respectable while texts from him are still flooding in.

> _Bobert: woke up to this_  
>  _Bobert: ass_  
>  _Bobert: shit john nice work_  
>  _Bobert: just_  
>  _Bobert: damn_  
>  _Bobert: almost wanna thank you_  
>  _Bobert: can just picture some faces when i say i survived a vamp attack_  
>  _Bobert: sure you ain’t a monster?_

Heat flares up from the base of my neck to the tips of my ears. At the very top of the text column is a compressed image icon that I swiftly tap open. The screen shifts to accommodate it, the loading wheel spins, and an image pops open that I have to stare at a moment before realizing what it’s of. A bare chest, shoulders, and neckline, ombre skin framed with red and white bed sheets and absolutely _covered_ in bruises, ovular bite marks, and dark red hickeys.

Amid furious blushing, a grin pulls at my lips until my cheeks pinch. I save the picture.

> _JohnnyMav: WOOPS_  
>  _JohnnyMav: DID I DO THAT_  
>  _JohnnyMav: Oh absolutely I am. The best kind of monster._  
>  _JohnnyMav: The kind that climbs into your window at night and rails you against the wall._

Okay, that might have been a bit much. But texts continue coming in and I flusteredly try to reply as fast as they appear. 

> _Bobert: jesus fuck john tell me you ain’t lyin_  
>  _Bobert: because i will leave my window unlocked_
> 
> _JohnnyMav: Oh my god Robert no_
> 
> _Bobert: try me plz_
> 
> _JohnnyMav: I mean_  
>  _JohnnyMav: Unless you really want to?_  
>  _JohnnyMav: Wait really?_
> 
> _Bobert: fuck yes_
> 
> _JohnnyMav: Oh my god I’m going bacvk to bed I’m not talking about this before 7am_
> 
> _Bobert: john wait_  
>  _Bobert: don’t put your phone down_  
>  _Bobert: john?_  
>  _Bobert: jooooooohn_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> **Please see my profile page for an important update on the future of this fic and my presence on AO3. It is not good news, but with your help that can change.**


	14. Cream of the Kelp

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The lap of a tongue may clean a wound or sate a lover. The lap of waves may wear away the shore, but so too are treasures washed in from the depths.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Click [here](http://crescentmoondemon.tumblr.com/post/165566760598#notes) for John’s canon appearance and profile.
> 
> Link to the [Terminology Master Post](http://crescentmoondemon.tumblr.com/post/165422480878#notes) which is updated regularly.
> 
> Full disclosure this has literally been one of my favorite chapters to write so far and I hope it shows <3

Robert does a fine job of pretending to be surprised that the inside of my house is, in fact, not made out of dirt. I laugh that one off but not without a well-meaning slug to his arm. Although I feel like it might be the polite thing to do, I don’t bother with a tour; Robert doesn’t strike me as the type to care for being shown around a place, and it’s not like there’s much to see.

There are framed photos on the walls, a basket of clean towels still needing to be put away, a bookshelf full of books and other knickknacks, and various evidence of the teenager who lives here in the form of a pile of binders on the coffee table, pink sweater slung over the couch, shoes piled by the door, and headphones and console controller haphazardly left where they landed on the old, repurposed computer chair. Robert briefly peruses my media center where he hums cryptically at a well-worn copy of _Labyrinth_ on DVD— _don’t question David Bowie,_ I tell him with a look—and nods his approval at my record collection. Thanks to help from Mat, my assortment of music has seen a resurgence. 

I say nothing, merely watch Robert go about my living room racking his brain for the differences in how a cryptid keeps his home as opposed to the average-everyday single dad. About the only thing of note is the swear jar with its two inches of spare change and a ten dollar bill on top.

“I promise you won’t find anything interesting,” I assure him, arms folded as I lean on the kitchen sink. “I made sure to toss last week’s human remains.”

Robert is still holding one of my vinyl copies of Santana when he grins at me over his shoulder. “Can never be too careful.”

Amanda is spending the night with friends, so we have the place to ourselves.

Eventually he must decide there really isn’t anything remarkable because he comes over and leans into the end of the kitchen counter facing me.

“Everything is so . . . _normal_ ,” he says almost perturbed. Like somehow that’s the strangest thing of all.

“Robert, buddy, you haven’t seen the underground. The caverns are enormous and jewel encrusted. Snow White’s seven dwarves are practically our housemates.”

“We can build our own empire of blood diamonds. The kingdom is ours, John.”

“And long live her kings, baby.”

We laugh.

“Seriously, though. My life is painfully ordinary. About the only thing that separates my life from a regular human’s is my excuses for being MIA some nights,” I say. “I pay bills, go to work, buy groceries, help my kid with homework, all that wholesome dad stuff. Sure I enjoy long walks by moonlight as much as the next guy, but I try to keep the bear wrestling to a minimum.”

He nods, doesn’t say anything, and quiet settles in. Unlike most times before, this one is noticeably a little awkward. Whereas Robert is always so at ease when out on the town and in his own home, it must show how long it’s been since I’ve entertained guests. I mean, what’s the proper etiquette nowadays? Do I make coffee? Dinner? Does Robert even care about those things? What if he does? Oh god, did I miss an opportunity to impress him? I didn’t even think to get any wine or Gentleman Jack for tonight.

Jeez, the severity of my overthinking must show bigtime because the longer the silence stretches on the more I realize I’m fidgeting and the slier Robert’s grin becomes.

He breaks the silence. “So. . . .”

“So,” I reply.

But he doesn’t show me anymore mercy, just watches me flounder.

Maybe this ice is too thick to break, I start to worry, run my hand down my face, scratch restlessly at the back of my neck, grimace. “Oh my god, I’m overthinking this, aren’t I?”

“Big time.”

Robert’s shoulders bob in amusement. I pictured myself being so suave about when it came to these things. Music playing and candles and a nice homemade meal. Up until I realized that would be the cheesiest schlock this end of the cosmos and he’d be the furthest thing from impressed imaginable. So what’s a dad to do, now?

Screw suave, I’m winging it.

“So,” I try again. Walking the few steps around the counter, fingertips trailing the tabletop. 

“So.” He doesn’t bother to conceal his wandering gaze.

“Are you hungry?”

“Not really.”

“Good.” The word comes out so deep it practically vibrates in me. I stop behind him, hands on the countertop on either side of him, and lay my chin on his shoulder. The leather is cool, and Robert leans ever so slightly into me. “Because I was thinking we could skip dinner and jump right into dessert.”

He hums deeply, fingers grazing mine as I slide one hand under the front of his shirt.

“Depends,” Robert murmurs. “What’s for dessert?”

The first pop is nothing to think twice about, just joints being old. The second maybe draws a little attention. It’s not until the fourth that Robert catches on, because my hands flex and my wrists pop out and back into alignment longer than before. His frame goes rigid as mine pops and cracks, and I change flush against his back. Letting him feel the flex and contortions of muscle as skin raises to blackened fur, nails extend into claws, quiet breaths morphing to groans then cavernous gales.

He doesn’t look, but by time I’ve finished I lean fully over him, chin curled over his shoulder as a voluminous exhale heats the air around him, he doesn’t need to.

 _“You,”_ I purr, curl my fingers between his legs, and squeeze the junction of his thighs.

Robert shivers, moans thickly, pushes his back into me while putting his weight into his hands. “Shit, _yes_.”

I place his sunglasses safely on the nearest barstool. Robert catches on when I turn him around and braces his hands on the edge of the table before being hefted up and deposited on the countertop. That sweetly stunned expression when he’s dragged in close is to die for, knees pushed apart to fit around lupine hips and wrists suddenly pinned by claws that could fit three of his hands comfortably. He stares up my muzzle at me, black and gray and perfectly illuminated in the bright light of my kitchen.

“My, what big teeth you have,” he smirks.

I stifle the sudden urge to laugh, and lick my lips showily. _“All the better to eat you with.”_

He absolutely eats it up.

 _“See something you like, Small?”_ I nose the crook of his neck, gusting it with heavy, hot puffs of moist air. _“Because I do.”_

“Fuck yeah,” Robert groans. Legs lock behind my waist, tugging my hips flush with his ass and canting upward into me. “Lookin’ at him.”

Wow.

_“Charmer.”_

His hands dig into the dense column of fur behind my head. I slide one hand beneath his shirt, fabric bunching over my knuckles, and drag my tongue up the muscular groove between his abs and pecks. Head dropping back, he groans, air cooling the wet trail causing his skin to break out in goosebumps. Jangling buckle as I undo his belt, tugging his hips up with it, and pull his fly down with my teeth. That does a good variety of things for him because he’s already half hard when I ease his boxers past his thighs, dragging the flat of my tongue over the trail of dark hair leading me from his pubic mound to his naval. 

I bump him playfully with my snout, watching him twitch and jump and groan spectacularly at the first long drag of tongue that brings him to full, rock hard attention.

“Fuck, John,” he curses sweetly. One hand grips white-knuckled onto the edge of the countertop while the other digs for a handful of my mane.

 _That’s it, big guy,_ I praise internally. _Let me take care of you._

I rumble deeply, sending vibrations through every inch of his body, wrap my long tongue around his length, and gingerly close my mouth on his cock. Something tells me this is one facet Robert will just never be able to get his mind around, because receiving head from an honest to god werewolf isn’t something you could probably find in the wildest of pornos.

He’s a shamelessly groaning mess inside a minute. One hand buried in my fur as the other scrabbles at the edge of the counter for something, anything to hold onto. My maw works his cock, tonguing in long swipes, sucking as best as anatomy allows. Cradling sensitive flesh between my tongue and the roof of my mouth, massaging the thick, pulsating vein on the underside of his shaft, and work him in steady, rhythmic swallows.

Robert curses, held firmly in place by one giant hand pushing down on his chest. Even if he wanted to, he wouldn’t be able to move. He knows that, has to feel it. A gruff assortment of groans, growls, huffs, and purrs send choruses down his dick, and it throbs hotly in my grasp. Massaging the head with the back of my tongue, the heady taste of bitter-salty-sweet precome has me swallowing almost constantly. Claws press delicate scratches down his chest, the other cradling his thigh. He bucks, kicks weakly without meaning to, but it barely registers as a bump to my chest; his legs are effectively tangled in his jeans.

Ragged pants, groans, and a thin glisten of sweat on his skin makes him glow. Robert mutters a rough warning, something charming like, “Fuck, I’m gonna come,” and I moan thrillingly. Purring a thick, wordless encouragement. Both his hands shoot to the back of my head, pushing me down, chin tipped back and neck bared for me. His stomach and thighs tense, and I bury my snout at the base of his cock, working him when he finally comes, swallowing him greedily.

I release him slow, letting his softening cock slide off my tongue before licking my pallet clean. Robert is thoroughly ruffled. Arms limp at his sides, breath leaving him in a long sigh.

 _“How about we move this to my den?”_ I ask him, positively drinking in the view of him splayed out like this.

Robert picks his head up, and he’s grinning broadly. “By all means.”

Chuckling, I slide him the rest of the way to me, pulling his jeans off fully, and sling them over one shoulder. Robert’s legs are about the consistency of jelly, but he still manages to lock them around me as I haul him onto my hips. Scarred fingers grasp handfuls of fur, and there’s a sting in the amount of weight he puts into it, but it’s as sweet as it is brief. He locks his arms around the back of my neck and noses into my throat on the way to my bedroom.

* * *

_Heavy in the **right** places,_ I think, purring as I cup the small of his back in my paw, rocking the toy slowly inside him.

Oh yes. Because Robert is not little by any stretch of the term. He’s dense. He’s strong. He clutches my chest, sweat clumping my fur beneath him, cock squeezed between our bellies. His back glistens in the low, low light, muscles clenching as he rolls back against my hand. Everything smells like sex, sweat, and want. Like him and it floods my lungs with each inhale, blurring the lines between my senses.

I cover him with my chin, purr heatedly. Pressing the toy deeper, Robert gasps, bucks.

“John,” he groans, fingers buried in my chest.

I nose into the top of his head, breathing him in deep, balmy gales. _“Just relax, Robert. Let me take care of you,”_ I hum. Licking behind his ear, delicately nibbling the shell of it.

He shivers, winding his arms around my neck. Hiking himself higher up my chest, grinding his cock into my middle. His scent floods everything around me; I bury myself in him. Gentle licks and nips traipsing his flesh, nibbling on skin already marred with small red scrapes. From claws or teeth, who knows by this point. Probably both.

_“Tell me what you want, big guy.”_

“Harder, John . . . c’mon, fuck—! Please. . . . Fuck me harder. . . .” Robert pants.

A scalding lace of pleasure quakes up my spine. _“Yesss, that’s it.”_

I stroke his back up and down, claws trailing the long divot of his spine from the crease of his ass all the way up to the back of his neck and down. He trembles magnificently, letting out a gruff whine when a large paw cups and squeezes his ass and thrusts the toy deep, twisting it in slow circles.

He rocks back on top of me. Elbows quaking, Robert pushes onto his hands, back bowed out in a lovely arch. He rolls his hips, taking the toy deeper, whining when I slip it away only to buck and jaw drop open when it’s swiftly thrust back into place. His eyes are dark. They shine beautifully in the dim, ambient light, catching every tiny glow and reflecting it all at me.

 _“Fuck, you’re gorgeous,”_ I groan, cock throbbing behind him, untouched in the wake of not wanting to take my hands off of him. 

Robert smirks down at me. Hair tousled and clumped with sweat. “You’re one’ta talk. . . .”

I purr. 

Watching him ride me like this—god, it shouldn’t be legal. He looks incredible. Toned body flush, sweaty, muscles flexing. His shoulders roll forward, flattening the heels of his palms on my chest. Head tipped back, baring his throat—does he mean to? Who the hell knows, but he looks fucking _amazing_.

He rides me faster, jerking his length as I hold the toy down for him. My cock aches, abused and unused, making it tough to focus but hell I want my hands on him more. I want to kiss him, touch him, fuck him. I want every inch of him pressed into every atom of me. I want his waist in my claws and his neck between my teeth. His tight heat gripping my cock, gasping, moaning as he takes me. On his knees as I cover him, make him mine.

 _“Come on, let me see you come, Robert,”_ I growl, gripping his thigh until jagged red welts form where my claws raze his skin. My pallet is dripping wet.

Robert pants, chest and shoulders heaving. His jaw tightens the skin over his temples pull taut. He looks at me through eyes half lidded, pleasure-heavy and bleary. When he finally comes, he seats himself on the toy with a breathy gasp and moan, jerking himself the last few rough strokes to completion, and spills a white splash of come across my chest. 

I rumble deep. He shudders, pliant as wet clay while I run my hands up his body and ease him onto me. Robert slumps boneless into my arms, shivering as I ease the toy out of him, set it aside, and wrap him up. I fall into amorous licks and nuzzles, murmuring soft praises beside his ear, tasting the salt of sweat on his shoulder and neck. The heady aroma of sex and come. How my fur is going to be clumpy and matted from it but I don’t care.

Fuck, I want. . . .

 _“Think you can take me tonight?”_ I ask softly, petting the small of his back and the welts on his thighs.

Robert hums into my neck, a smile in the sound. “Oh, fuck yes.”

I shiver through a full body groan, petting and palming flushed skin as Robert slips onto his side. Nips and lupine kisses lavish the crook of his neck and go rigid in a flash when a strong, callous hand takes my cock. I nearly come on the spot, jerking gracelessly into his hand.

My ears snap up, snagged from revelry by a clipped, musical tone from my phone on the bedside table. It’s Amanda’s text tone.

I groan, ears lain back in protest. _“I need to check that.”_

Robert grips me tighter, wringing a whine out of me with a stroking hand. Lips and teeth press beneath my chin, another hand plies at the base of my ears. Everything is melting down around me, and it’s clear he means to work me into a tizzy before I mount him. Biting the junction of my chin and neck—shit, I’m not going to last two minutes if he keeps that up.

“Ignore it,” Robert orders, voice hoarse.

I nearly do. Cock throbbing hot with need. Robert is here. He’s ready and he wants me, wants a varúlfur pinned beneath him or covering his back, teeth at the nape of his neck and claws gripping his hips.

But the text tone dings twice more and I know it can’t just be ignored.

 _“’S Amanda,”_ I groan, delicately extricating his hand from my dick. Pleadingly, “It’ll just take a sec.”

Robert does let go, and I rise onto my haunches. On his back, his legs are splayed apart, running his fingertips through mixed spatterings of come and lube on his inner thighs. His dick will need a few more minutes to recover, but neither he nor I have that kind of patience right now.

I purr hungrily at him, lick my lips, and grab my phone for a brief check to see what my kiddo is up to. I give it a once over and nearly put it back down. Until my ears fold back and my eyes widen with the double take.

> _Manda Panda: Cinnamon_  
>  _Manda Panda: We r out of cinnamon_  
>  _Manda Panda: Need to get more cinnamon at the store_

In the blue-white glow of the screen, Robert must see the equivalent of all the blood draining out of my face. He immediately stops, sits up.

Every drop of honey gone and replaced. “What is it? What’s wrong?”

I’m changing before I’m even fully off the bed. Everything is suddenly further away than expected. I drop like a brick on the hard floor, come up fully clothed, and Robert is already off the bed and grabbing for his pants. Fucking bless him, he gets it without even having to ask. He’s fully dressed almost before I remember where the hell I put my car keys.

Robert doesn’t ask, but I know my sudden frenzy has him worried.

“Something’s wrong,” is all I can really articulate. It’s all I really know myself. “She needs me. Right now.” 

He doesn’t question it, doesn’t even nod, just grabs his jacket and sunglasses and makes for the front door and has it open. Hurrying into the living room, I snatch my wallet, and there’s the barest moment of hesitation when I’m halfway out the door. My heart is pounding. I can’t tell if I’m hyperventilating.

I look at him. Robert’s face is tight, concern clear but silent.

“Are you coming with me?” I ask, not knowing and frankly not 1000% caring what answer I’ll get.

“If you want me to,” he says.

I nod.

We pile into my car. I about fishtail the thing pulling out of the driveway and make a beeline for Anna B.’s house. It’s quiet. Not awkward, not comfortable. Just painful, edgy silence. My fingers tap the steering wheel, leg bobbing when not otherwise putting pressure on the gas. Every stop sign and red light feels like an eternity.

I jump out of my skin when her text tone sounds again, but I’m driving. I glance at Robert pleadingly.

“What’s she saying?” I ask.

He fishes the phone from my center console. It lights up his face in the corner of my eye. “She’s asking where you are.”

“Tell her we’re on the way and ask what’s happening.”

> _Dadman: hey it’s robert i’m with your dad rn_  
>  _Dadman: we’re on the way. whats going on?_
> 
> _Manda Panda: Ok I just don’t wanna be here anymore_  
>  _Manda Panda: When u get here plz make it seem like I gotta go home_  
>  _Manda Panda: Plz_

He tells me as much.

“I know somethin’ you can tell them if you need it,” he offers.

I believe him. Sweet stars, bless his repertoire of little lies. Robert would be a lifesaver right now if I didn’t have this so well-rehearsed in my head. As it is, his presence alone is doing wonders to keep me composed.

“I already have something in mind. We plan for this sort of thing.”

From my peripherals, I see his head tilt to one side. The question is there. If this is just the result of thorough planning or if the thorough planning is the result of something more serious than _my friend is being a creep, come get me_. Because when a varúlfur raises a human there have to be more complications to plan for than inexplicable fur on the sofa.

It flashes through my head like it always does, makes my shoulder ache and my heart pound: _There are people who know about my kind. And those people aren’t **good** people._

He doesn’t ask, but I explain anyway, “’Cinnamon’ is a code word. It’s . . . Alex and I set it up when Amanda was little because she used to get nervous at slumber parties. She could call us and use it and we’d know she wanted to come home without embarrassing her in front of her friends. Now, it’s an emergency thing. ‘Drop everything and come get me right now’ kind of emergencies. She hasn’t used it in years.”

Robert nods slowly, occasionally glancing at the screen in case any new messages come through. None do, and I make a twenty minute drive in twelve. He swiftly shoots a message that we’ve arrived as I pull up to the curb out front of a stylish ‘60s style Spanish house with a pink tile roof and white deco. I throw my door open and get out.

Robert gets out as well but waits just outside his door. “You want me to come, too?”

I consider it, then shake my head and offer him a reassuring smile despite the block of granite ice congealed in my stomach. “I got this.”

Robert doesn’t seem convinced, but he takes me at my word and gets into the back seat.

It takes more self-control than I would like to admit, but somehow I manage not to sprint up the walking path to the ornately carved, red oak door. Despite the hour, all the lights are on inside and I can hear music seeping through the windows; I don’t recognize the tune, but it sounds teenager-y. It’s a lovely place even at night. Comfortable, homey, manicured. 

Anna B.(another one of Amanda’s friends who strayed true through the Emma-Noah fiasco)’s mother answers after two rings to the doorbell with pink slippers on and curlers in her hair. Confusion and annoyance melt away when she recognizes me under the porch light, and the stern impatience I wear must be Oscar worthy.

“Mr. Maverick?” she blinks, bewildered.

“Sorry to intrude on your evening, Mrs. B., but I’d like to speak with my daughter.”

Red flags don’t go off until the air from inside the house hits me. Even with senses dulled behind the façade it nearly knocks me off my feet. Faint ozone, sulphur from struck matches, burnt cheese and popcorn, and the musky, waxy smell of recently snuffed candles. Girlish laughter and oo’s and aw’s from another room, I think from a portion of the house that is not as well-lit as the rest.

Amanda, my beautiful girl, appears behind Mrs. B.’s arm in a blink, and the first thing I notice is she’s okay physically, no signs of an altercation, but there’s something keenly unsettling about her body language that I can’t pinpoint right away. It takes every ounce of control in me not to snatch her in my arms and whisk her out of there. For a second it looks like she might be about to smile, but I fix her with a hard, practiced look.

“Amanda Ann Maverick, what was the one thing I asked you to do before you left the house this evening?” I say to her curtly.

She catches on without a beat, shies away when Mrs. B. steps out of range of what is surely meant to be a fiery talking-to.

Amanda offers up her best sheepish, guilty half-smile of being caught with a bad report card. “Clean my room . . . ?”

“And what was the one thing you didn’t do?”

“Clean my room. . . .” True disappointment emanates from me to her, and she fidgets where she stands.

“Exactly.” I return my attention to Mrs. B. who looks more than a little miffed by the whole exchange. “I’m sorry, Mrs. B., but I’ll be taking my daughter home to finish her chores. She won’t be coming back to the sleepover tonight.”

The older woman crosses her arms at me, huffs because it is an astounding inconvenience to have one less mouth to feed.

“A high schooler with her own driver’s license hardly needs to be babied,” she says brusquely.

Part of me appreciates her defense on Amanda’s behalf more than I can let on at the moment.

I shake my head. “It’s the principle of it; I’m sure you understand.”

Mrs. B. sighs because she does and looks sympathetically to Amanda. My girl already has her bag over her shoulder, ready to go, and somehow that doesn’t strike Mrs. B. as odd. “I’m sorry, dear. I wish you could have stayed. Want to say bye to the girls?”

“Already did. Thanks for dinner, Anna’s Mom. Have a good night!” Amanda says in a rush, ducks under the older woman’s arm, and vaults down the two steps to my side.

My arm goes out instinctively across her shoulders as I turn down the walkway, and it’s then I notice how stiff she is.

Halfway down the path, the front door closes and I ask quietly, “What happened?”

“Tell you in the car.” Her eyes are fixed on the sidewalk, forcing herself not to dash for the car like I know she must want to while tension bleeds as much from her words as her arms clutching her bag strap.

We fall into our respective seats at the same time. Amanda briefly double takes at Robert in the backseat while clipping on her seatbelt; she smiles lightly. Some of that tension visibly ebbs.

“Y’okay, kid?” he asks.

“Yeah.”

He nods.

Not until we’ve gone four blocks and the house is completely out of view does Amanda finally relax. She slumps into her seat, eyes closed with an exhale like she means to push every ounce of air out of her lungs.

She reties her ribbon, putting her hair back up before speaking softly. “Dad, did you smell . . . ?”

I wait a beat for her to finish, but she doesn’t, and I know I have to fill in honestly.

“Ozone,” I answer, already suspecting what had upset her enough to warrant leaving, “candle wax, and matches.”

I glance at her from the corner of my eye as we pull up to a stop sign. Amanda fiddles with the cuff of her jacket sleeve.

“No sulphur?” She looks at me nervously here. There’s moisture in her eyes, a quiver in her lip. More than should be there after a rowdy but overall harmless night with friends.

“A little. From the matches.”

Her shoulders droop with visible relief.

Amanda looks down at her lap, guilt suddenly in her eyes. Maybe from leaving her friends, maybe from interrupting what she probably figures was a nice night out between Robert and I, maybe because she feels like a little kid again and not in a good way. She finally explains, “Anna and them were playing with a Ouija board.”

My hands clench the steering wheel as the rest of me goes ramrod straight. In the rearview mirror, my eyes lock with Robert’s. He hasn’t said anything, but while the interest is there so is the concern. Hollywood features untold numbers of Ouija board related horror flicks; surely he already has a grasp of why that might make a cryptid and his kin uneasy.

I take one hand off the wheel long enough to squeeze hers. Amanda gives me a slightly cheerier look, squeezing back. Grateful for whatever support I have to offer.

“I’m glad you messaged me. You made the right decision to get out of there,” I tell her.

Amanda knows. I know she knows, but she needs to hear it. _You did the right thing. I’m happy you called. I’m proud of you._

My focus returns to the road, but when there’s a light tapping on her arm Amanda turns halfway to find Robert there with his sunglasses on and reflecting herself two-fold.

“You had me at Ouija board,” he says, completely serious while peering over the top of his lenses, one thick eyebrow raised almost to his hairline.

Amanda snorts and giggles. She looks at me for permission, and the complete loss of tension is palpable. I can’t help the little smile of warm relief.

I glance at him in the mirror. He looks ridiculous with those shades on in the middle of the night, and I’m so thankful for it. “Might as well. Biggest secret’s already out. Everything else is just bonus material.”

Amanda audibly squeaks and whips around in her seat so fast her seatbelt locks and she has to wiggle it loose again. I can just picture the stars in her eyes.

“How much has he told you about varúlfur history?” she asks.

“Not much. Just that a lot of it was lost, and what’s left isn’t reliable.”

“Yeah, it’s like that for a lot of races, especially the arcane stuff like witchcraft and spells and junk. That’s where Ouija boards come from, but the thing about magic is it got learned in the first place, so what was lost is all kind of being rediscovered in bits and pieces. Spirit Boards are one of those things, but it’s like—they got rediscovered in a time when no one really knew how to use them properly? They’re kind of like a tool for talking to what you can’t see, but they wound up getting marketed as a two-way radio for the dead.”

“Communicating with the dead. Yeah, I got that part.”

But Amanda shakes her head, getting even more excited. “Not just spirits and stuff. Demons and other things, too.”

Normally I don’t like talking about the arcane because it isn’t my specialty, but here I make an exception. “They’re a tool, not a toy. They’re meant to be used by certain people a certain way. Humans don’t realize how dangerous they actually are until possessions happen. Using a Ouija board doesn’t involve just talking to a ghost; the act of communicating opens a pathway from a different plane of existence, and if you’re not careful a lot of really bad things can come through.”

“So . . . Hollywood was right?” Robert asks. He sounds surprised.

Amanda nods. “It’s a rarity, but yeah. For the most part.”

“What were they supposed to be used by?”

“Witches,” I say, checking both ways at an intersection. “Anyone else using them is like giving a five-year-old a belt sander.”

Robert grimaces, but the other bit of information has his attention. “Witches are real?”

“Of course!” Here, Amanda beams, and I know she must be thinking about the ceremony a friend from Louisiana performed for her when her tenth birthday corresponded with a Harvest Moon. It was a beautiful thing. “Wicca, Hoodoo, Santeria—they’ve been practiced for centuries, and those are just the modern incarnations. Magic and spells have been around as long as the fae, some think longer!”

Robert blinks several times, showing more through his eyebrow movements until he finally just removes the glasses altogether. His gaze is on me in the rearview mirror. “So there is information that goes back that far, but how do the varúlfur not have any knowledge of themselves at all? Wouldn’t other cryptids know?”

A reasonable question, if a difficult one to answer. Amanda looks at me practically bobbing in her seat like she’s fit to burst. I nod my permission.

“By how Gramma explained it: a lot of eggs got put into one basket, then the basket went up Library of Alexandria style.”

“Oh.”

“But yeah, some of the other races like the fae remember. They’re one of the longest lived, but they’re also finicky and proud. When they don’t want to share, they don’t. Period. And they don’t wanna share what happened.”

I mutter more to myself than for Robert’s benefit, “Which makes some of us think it was something bad. Not just humans trying to wipe out varúlfur, but something involving most if not all of the races. Some think there was a war.”

Robert is leaning so far forward he’s nearly in the front seat with us, both arms folded over the divider that separates the driver and passenger seats. Jesus, he better have his seatbelt on.

“A war between humans and cryptids? Sounds like some _Underworld: Rise of the Fairies_ shit right there,” he says.

Amanda snorts and giggles crazily, and I manage not to be too put off by her innocent ears hearing a bad word.

On a slightly more serious note, Robert looks at me in the mirror, and his earnestness is not difficult to decipher. “What do _you_ think happened?”

I take a moment to think, and the stoplight we come to affords me a better chance to sit back and truly consider. I’ve had my theories. Everyone in my family has them. Hell, everyone from every race I’ve ever spoken to has them. Varúlfur aren’t the only race with a gigantic black hole in their history books. Whatever happened, it involved a lot of species. More than I believed could be affected by crusades, inquisitions, and witch hunts.

“I think a lot of different people disagreed on a lot of important things,” is the most concise way I can formulate it. _Like who deserved to live or die,_ I don’t say.

Robert nods slow, and I get the feeling that maybe he doesn’t need me to say it. The insinuation is there, and it doesn’t have to be subtle. Maybe Amanda misses it; maybe she just doesn’t want to go into detail right now. Nevertheless, my daughter grins over at me as inertia presses her into the back of her seat when my foot returns to the gas pedal.

“I told you he could handle this just fine.”

* * *

The drive home normally doesn’t take more than a few minutes, but Amanda is wired. Apparently that’s what happens when high schoolers sleep over. Everyone eats boatloads of chips, marshmallows, and soda until sleep is, truly, for the weak. So, we don’t go straight home. 

“My treat,” I insist.

Robert seems ready to push, but I do my best not to give him the chance. Taste in liquor aside, everyone has a sweet tooth. That this is a hang-up at all confounds me. We buy each other drinks all the time, so how is this any different?

“Come on, I _want_ to.”

He hesitates. The inclination is starting to come through. It’s now or never.

“Anything you want.”

Robert sighs, defeated but not bitter about it. My victorious grin is not easy to hide.

The teenager behind the counter is so mindlessly bored he gapes open-mouthed at us, eyes blinking out of order in an accurate rendition of someone who has gone straight-up zombie.

Robert places his order for pistachio-mocha soft-serve. Amanda takes the route of the reliably delicious strawberry-vanilla swirl with rainbow sprinkles, and I go all-in with a caramel, black-raspberry swirl in a chocolate shell. Once all cones are in hand, we pick a direction and walk.

I look curiously at Robert’s cone of coffee colored goodness tinted with green swirls.

“Is that actually any good?” I ask. Pistachio and mocha just don’t seem to pair up in my head. Wait, isn’t coffee a bean and pistachio a nut? I guess that makes them kinda similar, but in ice cream? My skepticism lingers.

Robert cocks an eyebrow at me, lowers his treat, and licks some from the corner of his mouth; there’s a sizeable dent where he just took a bite. “Don’t tell me you never tried this before. How have you lived? _Where_ have you lived? How are you alive right now? It’s the most delicious confectionery treat the world has ever known. Gods have become mortal just to chance a taste.”

Wow, he can really sell that.

“Can I try some?”

Robert holds up his ice cream. I go in for a nibble, but my trust is misplaced when the cone is raised an inch without warning. It nets me a nose full of frosty, coffee flavored treat, and I reel back, sputtering and glowering at Robert laughing riotously. Even Amanda, who saw me get face-noshed with ice cream-y goodness, giggles shamelessly. I lick my lips—oh, wow, that is good!—and wipe my nose on the back of my hand.

“Very cute,” I mutter.

Robert grins. “Aren’t I?” 

Everything has sand on it. Fine, powdery white granules that blanket everything in sight like snow. As we skirt the sidewalk separating a barren parking lot from a high row of grassy dunes, our feet crunch over old shells and shuffle mutedly on scattered patches of sand. Amanda finds a long, curvy piece of driftwood among the side of a dune and runs it along the chain separating us from the beach. Its worn, dry wood clatters every time it strikes a link. The air smells strongly of salt water, slightly fishy undertones, and sand. All the requisite smells of the ocean.

Amanda smacks her stick on one of the wooden posts, and that’s about when I notice Robert has stopped walking. There is a sign listing haphazardly partway up a dune, its concrete base poking out of the sand and high grass.

> _Beach Hours:_  
>  _Sunday – Saturday_  
>  _7am – 8pm_

It is very much after hours.

He looks at me over his shoulder, and I already know what he’s thinking. Amanda hasn’t noticed us fall behind and is still making her way down the sidewalk, smacking her stick on posts as she goes.

“Hey, Amanda!” Robert calls before I have the chance.

She whips around, eyes bright and alert at the sound of her name. “Yeah?”

“C’mere.”

She trots back, gives me a questioning look (surely I know what this is all about), but I just shrug in Robert’s general direction and take a bite out of my waffle cone.

“What’s up?” Amanda asks. Her ice cream is nearly gone.

Robert points to the sign with a callous finger just starting to get melted on. “Gotta very important question for you,” he begins, highly innocuous. He puts the side of the finger to his lips and it comes away clean. “How wild you feelin’, wolf girl?”

Amanda gives him a confused head tilt, and between her yellow ribbon and ponytail propped high on her head the gesture looks almost lupine, as if she had ears pointed high and alert; a big part of me bristles with fatherly pride. She looks to the sign, to Robert, back to the sign with a furrowed brow. When realization dawns, eyes widen and a gigantic grin splits across her face. She looks at me as if seeking permission. Sabotaged before I could even get my piece in, I think, sag my shoulders, and nod.

Both her hands raise into balled fists, and there are literal stars shining in her eyes this time.

“Are you kidding? You don’t get wilder than me,” she exclaims. _“I was raised by wolves!”_

Without missing a beat, Amanda leaps over the low slouch of chain and scampers up the grassy dune. Once at the top, she throws both arms into the air, stick raised skyward, and proclaims, _“I gotta problem with authorityyyy!”_ and dashes down the opposite slope out of view.

Robert and I laugh uncontrollably. There’s something about earnest, parentally condoned rebellion that is just so wholesome to the both of us.

He smiles at me, and I grin back.

“Thank you,” I say.

My daughter needs good role models, but sometimes those good role models can have a mild-to-moderately skewed moral compass. That’s okay. Plus, well, with Amanda so unnerved over the Ouija board thing, it was a lifesaver having another person around to dispel the tension. Even right now when the danger is passed, having him here makes looking at the world so much less intimidating.

He nods.

There’s a beat. He’s looking at me, and I’m looking at him. There’s lamplight from the posts in the parking lot adjacent to us; moon light from a thin crescent, partially covered by clouds. It isn’t much, but it’s something, and it frames him so well.

“You’re welcome,” Robert murmurs.

I don’t realize I’m leaning in until I’ve already committed, but by then there’s no want or reason to go back. My hand finds the nape of his neck with ease, and he presses fully into my lips without hesitation. He tastes like coffee, a bit of savory pistachio underneath, some chocolate and raspberry from my own. He loops his arm behind my back, the other carding up the back of my head, pulling me closer, the kiss deeper.

Robert looks utterly pleased with himself by time we break; I’m probably a tad more on the shy side but still over the freaking moon. Because even in the middle of the night with no one around, PDA still makes my stomach flip on its head.

“Sorry tonight didn’t go as planned,” I mutter, looking down a little. Even without meaning to focus on anything, my gaze still falls squarely on his lips. Lips that could have otherwise been parted around thick, savory moans.

“Don’t be,” Robert says firmly, strokes a thumb behind my ear so my eyelids flutter. “She’s your kid. Good to see she matters that much to you.”

He has to already know that, though. “I wouldn’t be here without her.”

Robert nods, probably agreeing with some vague inclination of me off gallivanting with my own kind in the wilderness somewhere if I didn’t have a daughter to ground me seaside, but it’s clear he doesn’t get my real meaning. That’s fine. Maybe one day I’ll tell him just how much of this is owed solely to Amanda. How close I came to giving up on this. To turning away and never looking back. How mermaids aren’t the only creatures around here playing matchmaker. 

“You got your priorities straight,” he continues, eyes darting back and forth between my own. “I always admired that about you.”

It takes a second for that to spin its four-thousand loops around my heart. Because Robert Small, one of the most badass people I know, admires _me_? That’s . . . wow.

For a split second, I think that’s all it’s going to be. But it isn’t. I don’t know what queues me in. If it’s some imperceptible shift in body language, some quirk of expression, a change in his scent. But there’s something else there. The intensity in how he looks at me. _You got your priorities straight._ The way he says it. Like it’s not something he would otherwise expect from someone he associates with.

Or from someone who associates with _him_.

But it’s gone so fast I’m pretty sure I imagined it.

A voice shouts over the opposite side of the dunes, “Hey, you two coming or what?”

“Coming!” I call in her direction. Allowing my weight to sag forward, I hum less than an inch from Robert’s lips, “Wanna go break some rules?”

Robert pushes his wrist harder into my back, his lips into the corner of my mouth. “I’m startin’ to see where she gets it from.”

I treat him with a flash of amber, and his pulse audibly quickens. Robert kisses me again just because we can, and brief though it is he makes up for it with several amorous bites.

On the other side of the dunes, white sand stretches as far as the eye can see in either direction. Beyond that: an infinite span of dark, gently rolling ocean. Maple Bay is just small and sleepy enough that it isn’t thought of as a vacation spot, so when the beach is deserted, it’s _deserted_. Not even seagulls. Amanda is poking around a deposit of seashells with her stick while humming the _Mission Impossible_ theme, guided along by the light of her phone.

Even in the near dark, it isn’t hard to see. Everything is open and clear, there’s ambient light from the moon and lamp posts that peek over the dunes. Amanda, seeing we’ve made it over, dashes on ahead of us, and part of me wants to call her back before she can get out of sight, but I don’t. Reminders that she isn’t a kid anymore aren’t scarce, and it’s not like anything is a threat to her out here. I took on a black bear for the thought of keeping her safe. I’d take on far worse to actually defend her.

Nowhere in the world is safer than right here. For either of them.

That fact pleases me immensely.

Except when it comes to the ocean. The ocean is vast and terrifying. Man, screw the ocean.

We walk along at our own pace. Occasionally one of us will say something and the other will respond. Nothing much beyond that. Amanda keeps several paces ahead of us, dragging her stick along in nonsensical patterns, using it to dig up spots in the tideline, poke at dead fish, and sort through clusters of shells. At one point she discovers a shark tooth, tiny and blackened with age, and you’d think she found a pirate horde.

Sounds of the waves lapping at the shore and faint shuffling of feet on sand are all there is. It’s quiet, comfortable. Amanda takes pictures. Knuckles bump once into mine, innocently. I think nothing of it, finish off my ice cream, but the second time it gets a glance in his direction. Robert is focused on his cone, but even then his fingers ply with those curled at my side. Heat spreads up my neck, and my fingers unfurl as his knit their way into them. My blush is fiery, and if the color on his cheeks is anything to go by it flusters him, too.

We walk that way for a long time. Not speaking. Just the occasional glance from the corner of the eye. He’s smiling, and for the life of me I can’t stop smiling either. The warmth of it. Calloused with small cuts and scars, sturdy and firm. How tentative and shy mine must feel by comparison. If they do, it must not bother him. He only holds a little tighter.

Amanda is already at the tidal pools when we catch up, just finishing off our ice creams. She lingers at the lip of one using the light of her phone’s camera flash to see what lurks within. Abundances of sea stars, urchins, small fish, all manner of plants and algae, ghostly little shrimps, and crabs that quickly skitter out of sight from the bright flash. It is a neat sight. Robert and I join her, and she regales us with a vast repertoire of marine facts that would make Hugo proud.

While snapping photos of a starfish and urchin locked in a slow duel to the death, Amanda abruptly pauses. She picks her head up, a curious expression on her face. She gazes out over the water intently, but when I’m about to ask she shrugs it off and goes back to photographing. A crab perches victorious stop an urchin perch (perchin, heh), and after a few snaps of that she stops, looks up again, and it’s clear something is amiss. This time the perturbation on her face is obvious, attention trained towards open water.

“What is it, Panda?” I ask, now equally curious.

“Tell me you’re hearing that, too,” she tells me with a frown.

I listen closely, ears attune to the waves, but don’t hear anything. I let the full spectrum of my senses come through, and still I don’t hear or see a thing. Just waving, rippling water. Smell of ocean and fish. Even Robert trains his attention out over the water, stepping to the other side of the tide pools for a different angle.

“Whatcha hearin’, kid?” Robert asks.

“Splashes.”

Robert and I exchange looks.

“The ocean . . . tends to do that, honey,” I say, fighting not to smile.

Amanda gives me a flat look; Robert’s lips purse as he holds back a grin.

“No, I know that, I mean like—” She doesn’t finish, merely glowers into the distance. With a thoughtful look at her phone, Amanda frowns harder and snaps one then two more photos in quick succession towards the waves.

We wait. Seconds tick by in tense quiet.

I fold my arms, cock my head as Robert stands from his crouched position at the end of the pools. My first thought is it must be a jumping fish, maybe waves breaking over a sandbar or submerged debris, but there is a worry in the back of my mind if it could be a swimmer in distress. Maybe being eaten by one of those treacherous whales. It’s a heavy notion, one which must weigh in the backs of all three of our minds. So does the thought of that shark from _Jaws_.

“Splashing isn’t weird in itself, but—” I stop short when ears perk suddenly beneath the façade.

One splash followed swiftly by another two. Wolf eyes snap keenly into the dark, I catch sight of the splashes a few dozen yards out into the surf. The broad, flat expanse of a ridged fin rears up out of the placid surf before striking downward with a noisy _slap_. 

A toothy grin splits wide across Amanda’s face when she comes to the same realization I have.

“Well, I’ll be,” I smile, eyes back to their less striking color.

“NO WAY!” Amanda leaps off the rocky ledge and takes off at a sprint.

There’s just enough time for me and Robert to look at each other before we turn and run behind her. The resistance from the sand slows me down, and I know implicitly my body will hate me in the morning, but Amanda’s giddy squeals and cheers to _Come on, hurry! We gotta catch up!_ egg us on. 

“What’s going on?” Robert huffs just behind me, not having it any easier.

“No time! Just run!” I exclaim.

Amanda turns sharply and clambers up and to the end of a large concrete groyne jutting out into the water. Its rounded top sits higher than the crests of the tallest waves but slopes down at the end. My first act upon catching up is to grab her by the back of her bomber jacket and pull her further from the edge. Robert pulls to a stop right beside me, and suddenly the groyne has a lot less space to it. Another camera flash is answered by another slap of water, closer this time. 

Cupping her hands on either side of her mouth, Amanda shouts towards the sounds, “Auf’n vinur!”

Robert gives me a weird look. I want to explain. Man, I _really_ want to explain, but it would be so much cooler to just let him see on his own.

“She’s telling them we’re friends,” is the only enlightenment I offer.

He furrows his eyebrows at me, further perturbed. “Telling who?”

I don’t get to answer. Amanda is suddenly exclaiming, “Back up, back up, _back up_ ,” and backpedaling into us both.

I grab them by the backs of their jackets and drag them away from the end of the groyne in time to avoid a column of water when it erupts at the front of where Amanda was just standing. She nearly slips off but catches herself. Robert’s hand flies to my upper arm, clutching tight, eyes wide as saucers.

It’s nothing out of the ordinary for me or Amanda—we’ve seen them before—but for Robert the sight will probably be etched into his memory right alongside hulking black fur rifling through the bed of his pickup to make a snack of his dog. Three rows of long, boney cranial fins and vibrantly contrasted green and blue scales tell me male. Above the water, his shape is eerily human: sleek, narrow shoulders and slender chest, long arms crested with fins down either forearm, five webbed digits on either hand, a neck lined with four pink, feathery gill slits, and a face that is equal parts human, ichthian, and gray alien with its broad mouth, gigantic black eyes, nostril slits, and fin-like protuberances in place of ears. Beneath the water, his lower half swishes side to side creating a small wake.

He smiles a mouthful of narrow, pointy teeth, arms folded just above the furthest curve of the concrete mound.

“Ift smil natt, whānau,” he greets us, the sound halfway hissed and garbled in his throat. Under water, it would sound so sweet as to be bewitching. Out of water, the effect is not as impressive.

I feel Robert leaning and pull him gingerly back.

“Og du,” Amanda and I say together.

He has not finished staring, likely never will, but that apparently snaps Robert out of it.

“Holy mother of—” he mouths, doesn’t have a chance to finish.

The mer titters as his fin curls and kicks up more waves. “What’s it, vinur? Been a while since your last mer?”

“First time, actually,” Amanda states, glancing at Robert over her shoulder. “He’s ny vinur.”

The mer blinks, surprised, and pushes up on his hands. The stretch pulls more of his body out of the water. Looped around his torso is a decorative, braided rope of finely woven seagrass decorated in shells, spines, teeth, and what look suspiciously like tin bottle caps. Where his hips would be, a pair of muscular, arm-like secondary fins aid him in balancing on the rock.

“Really?” The mer looks to me for confirmation. His scales gleam and his gills fan in and out.

Robert glances my way, too. Still gaping. 

Wow, way to put a guy on the spot. I nod.

The mer grins a jagged, toothy smile. His tail claps noisily, and he hums a sound not unlike a pleased cat. “In that case—a pleasure to take your mer cherry, friend. Come swimming with me sometime. I’d be delighted to take your other cherries, too.”

On reflex, my body goes tense, some part of me expecting Robert to recoil from the lewd comment. Perhaps something I should not have neglected was the mers’ brazenness. Amanda balks, red in the ears. Had I not expected it, I would have, too.

But Robert does not so much as flinch. He smirks, crouches down as the mer stretches up, the two nearly at eye level. “Kind offer, but I ain’t a virgin.”

The mer’s grin broadens to something almost shark-like. His tail flicks, cranial fins wavering in a gesture of delight.

The mer looks at me, but still speaks to Robert, “Indeed.”

I blush.

“Oh my god—there is a _child_ present,” Amanda balks.

* * *

“He ain’t one of the dangerous ones, right?” Robert asks. “The ones that eat sailors?”

I raise an eyebrow at him as we step off the groyne and onto the sand. The mer follows Amanda’s stride, walking on his hands in the shallows as she wades through calf-deep water so the two can chat.

“You really think I’d let my daughter play with one of the dangerous ones?”

He frowns. Point taken. “What do the dangerous ones look like?”

“More colorful, less frilly. They contrast, mostly in reds and whites. Think: ‘see a clown, you drown.’ But they need warmer water. Here’s safe.”

“That one isn’t a threat, though?”

I grin a little and nudge his boot with mine. “No more than the werewolf you’re talking to.”

Robert smiles.

* * *

“What’s down there?” Robert asks, jeans rolled halfway up his calves.

“Water. Lots of that.” The mer lies in the shallows, waves gently lapping over his back, tailfin lolling to one side, and chin perched in his hands. His giant black eyes reflect the distant lamplight like obsidian mirrors. “Some sand. Shells if you know where to look.”

Robert frowns. Amanda and I snigger, not because it’s funny—although, it really is—but because watching Robert feel his way around a new cryptid is an absolute riot. Some part of me wonders, if that night on the overlook had gone differently, if this is how we might have talked.

“Monsters,” he amends, “creatures, weird things. What’s down there? Deep down where there’s no sun.”

“Fish. Crabs. Squidlings. All the weird stuff is up here. _You’re_ the weirdest thing I’ve seen in forty tides.”

Robert is at a loss by this time. The mer has dodged every question he’s thrown his way, and it’s become clear that Amanda and I need to swoop in for a rescue.

“You know, there’s an etiquette for things like this,” I say.

“Mhm,” Amanda hums her affirmative. “You want something, you gotta give something.”

He looks between the two of us, confused but accepting. Crouching down, Robert is closer to the mer who shifts more comfortably onto his forearms, his blue-green lips pressed into an equally bemused and expectant smile.

“I’m curious about you. I want to know about the world you come from,” Robert explains. His tone is genuine. Searching and earnest but not pushy. “Would you be willing to trade for honest answers?”

Taking a moment to consider, the mer says, “What do you have to trade?”

Robert rifles through his pockets, producing little more than some crumpled receipts and maybe more pocket knives than any regular man should have at a given moment, but his expression perks. From the depths of one pocket he produces a little, whittled bird, a robin I think. The mer’s eyes light up before he even offers it.

The mer’s interest doesn’t go unnoticed, but Robert offers the tiny sculpture as he asks, “Will this do?”

After a brief examination, the mer accepts the token, and from there his answers become far more colorful. More embellished than any fisherman’s tale, I’d say, but even Amanda and I have to take a moment to appreciate them. It’s not every day a mer can be launched into stories of the deep. Of frolicking with dolphins in the surf, hunting with spears fashioned from stingray barbs, darting away from and fending off the gaping maws of hungry sharks, and what truly lurks in the deep, far below where the sunlight cannot reach. What shiny shapes glint up from the blackness. What tiny creatures may shine, and what leviathan eyes might reflect.

* * *

“Thanks for coming with me tonight,” I tell him.

“You’re welcome,” Robert says, hands resting inward while his arms lay across his knees. “We should do this more often.

“Ouija boards, ice cream, and mermaids. Just another late night at the Maverick house.”

“Party every night?”

“24/7 rage fests,” I grin.

He smirks, chuckling to himself.

From where we sit a little further up the beach, we have a perfect vantage point of Amanda, shoeless, waded into ankle-deep water to carry on an animated conversation with our new friend. She waves her driftwood stick about, mindful of her aquatic companion lounging alongside her like a beached dolphin, waves swirling around his tail and lapping over his sides and gills. Snippets of conversation reach me over the sounds of the breeze and waves: something about “and then Lucien hit him” and she dramatically swipes the air with her stick. The mer claps the water as if to provide the impact sound, and they crow with laughter.

Making friends has always been so easy for her, regardless of age, gender, or species. I’ve always been envious of that in some ways. Where I get anxious and would rather lounge at home with my word jumbles, she’ll come home from school and regale me with stories featuring a hundred names I can’t even dream of keeping track of. I’m pretty sure she knows half the population of her school on a first name basis.

Making friends is almost a chore for me, but I’ll always be grateful for that not-so-gentle nudge she gave me our first night in Maple Bay. The nudge that saw me going home with a stranger and set us on this crazy path.

“She wanted to be a mermaid when she was six.” It comes out without thinking. This isn’t even the first time I’ve watched Amanda standing in the shallows entertaining a transfixed mer.

Robert stops midway through fishing a cigarette from his pack, looks at me with one eyebrow raised and the corner of his mouth quirked. He looks out at Amanda and the mer, and she looks to be enacting her favorite scene from _The Matrix_. “That’s adorable.”

My shoulders bounce as I giggle, remembering Amanda, smaller by two feet and younger more than ten years, large red floaties on her upper arms and trying to swim to Alex with her legs together and getting frustrated that she wasn’t moving faster.

“It was. The first time she watched _The Little Mermaid_ it was out with horsies and in with dolphins and whale sharks.”

“An’ how’d that go?”

“I wanted to tell her it wasn’t possible. Imagination or not, it seemed unfair to get her hopes up since she couldn’t breathe underwater and all.”

Robert picks out a cigarette and holds it between his fingers, but he doesn’t go for his lighter just yet. “What happened?”

“Alex wouldn’t let me.”

The memory of Alex’s miffed expression is as cute as it is daunting, because human or not that man was downright terrifying when he went into papa-bear mode over our little girl, and the mere thought of dashing our girl’s dream was enough to land me in hot water for several days. The way he crossed his arms when he was about to deliver me an argument there was no way of winning. (Amanda picked up his skills as an orator, it seems.) Because dammit our daughter wanted to be a mermaid and to hell with telling her she couldn’t just because she had to come up for air.

The following weeks of shopping for adorable swimsuits, goggles, and floaties, and visits to the beach and local YMCA are still ones I look back on fondly. How fear flipped into ear splitting shrieks of delight when a kindly sisterhood of mermaids invited her to swim in their secluded, sun-warmed lagoon. They were elated to make a sister of her, if a bit worried as it how she would swim without a tail. Regardless, she learned to hold onto Alex’s hands for balance as she practiced her breaths, cling to my mane while she bobbed on her back for kicking, and exchanged jubilant splashes with darting, giggling, scaly faces. She still has the whelk shell they gave her on her jewelry box and a polaroid photo Alex took of the ten of us crammed together in her album.

Robert flicks his lighter open, and heat crackles at the end of his cigarette. He breathes deep, slides the lighter back into its pocket, and wind carries the smoke away from me.

“Said our daughter could be whatever she wanted, and if she wanted to be a mermaid then dammit she was going to be a mermaid.”

“Good man,” Robert says.

“There are hundreds of merfolk species, Robert. She wanted to be a great white shark.”

Twin lines of smoke jet from his nostrils as he snorts gracelessly, covers his wincing grin with the back of his hand.

“We even played _Jaws_ music and flailed and screamed when she swam towards us.”

Robert takes the cigarette in his fingers and laughs so hard it devolves into a fit of coughing. He tilts his head back, grinning and laughing, and my belly flips in circles at the sight.

“Sounds fishy to me,” Robert says.

“It was a halibut good time.”

“I can sea how getting her out of the water might have been a fishue.”

“We made a point not to be shellfish with water time. She’s the best shark in the tunaverse.”

“You’re reeling me in with this story, John.”

“Yeah? I was thinking my delivery cod have been better.”

We smirk at each other because we’re both adults who know no shame, and we both descend into reprehensible laughs. Hard enough it gets us curious glances from Amanda and the mer. He says something to her, she shrugs, and they return to chatting.

Amanda’s back is to us. She holds her stick to the side like a cane or staff, never quite putting enough weight on it to break it or sink into the sand. Her pant legs are rolled up over her calves, shoes safe in the sand next to us. The mer lounges beside her looking up, scales glinting in the small moonlight, occasionally splashing water over his gills or shifting sides when one becomes too dry, but never once does his attention deviate. Whatever they’re talking about, it transfixes them both. Amanda wanted to be a mermaid when she was little, but I’ve begun to wonder if she realizes how great of a diplomat she would make.

“Was it ever difficult for you?” Robert asks, drawing my attention back. “Raising a kid and being a cryptid at the same time?”

He says it like there should be a TV show for it. _My Single Cryptid Parent_. The shenanigans of a varúlfur raising a human, moving to a new town, high school drama ensues, and getting back into the dating scene against all odds. I’d watch the hell out of that.

“Honestly? I wouldn’t know any other way. It’s never been _easy_ , but that’s less to do with being a cryptid and more that fatherhood is a rollercoaster from start to finish,” I say, amused by the mere thought of raising my daughter as anything other than a varúlfur. I can play at being human fine most days, but actually being one? I’ve always liked me just the way I am. “It was less difficult before Alex passed, but that’s something Amanda and I have gotten through together.”

Robert nods once, and I wonder if he’s going to drop the topic. Part of me hopes that he will—talking about it makes things awkward sometimes, and even the happiest memories carry a tinge of sadness to them—but another part is curious if it might spur him into talking about his family. He does, it seems, let it drop.

I pull my legs up, ignoring a twinge from my bad knee—curse all that running without stretching—and wrap my arms around them loosely.

I smile wistfully. “There’s a lot I wish could have gone differently. Some things I’d change if I could. But I’m so proud of her.”

Amanda hands the mer her stick, and he lies back in the surf to examine it more closely.

“What about this?” Robert asks.

I blink once, raise an eyebrow. “’This’ what?”

He shrugs, clarifies, “Me knowing. How it all turned out. This. Us.”

Shy heat flares from the base of my neck to the tips of my ears.

 _Us,_ he says. Not ‘me’ and ‘you’ individuals. ‘Us’ a unit.

Do I wish this could have gone differently? Oh hell yes. Preferably in a way that didn’t give me anxiety attacks and heartburn for weeks leading up to the most catastrophic slip-up in cryptid history. If not for the happy ending, my story would be a cautionary tale worthy of being told around a campfire.

“Wish I could have _told_ you rather than let it slip over some dumb ‘Danger is my middle name’ comment.” I half laugh it while rubbing the back of my neck. “God, I feel like such an idiot when I think about it. All that trouble I went through to keep things under wraps and _poof_! Twenty years of carefully crafted normalcy up in smoke.”

Robert takes a drag, mist pluming from his lips. “If you need some pointers, just ask. From one story-teller to another.” I give him a knowing smirk, and he returns it in a way that in no uncertain terms makes me what to slip that jacket off his shoulders and do unspeakable things to his neckline. “Were you really going to tell me?”

At one point? I was honestly considering it. Wanted to wait a while, see how things panned out before committing. But I did seriously entertain it.

“Yeah.”

“You seemed pretty hell-bent on keeping it all from me. How would you have done it?”

I chortle, shift up until my legs are under me, and already know there is sand in my shoes. “It was going to be great; I had it all planned out. I was going to abduct you from the woods and whisk you away to the peak of the highest mountain. Had the sacrificial altar all set up, even had the drinks picked out and everything. That sky deity was pissed when we never showed. It was going to be such a romantic dinner: full moon, candle light, roast venison, and a bottle of ’87 single malt scotch. Would have wined and dined you like a true gentlewolf.”

His jaw drops at the scotch bit. Finishing his cigarette, he makes a small hole in the sand and buries it. “Romantic dinner at a sacrificial altar? Great booze? Witnessed by an ancient and powerful deity? Man after my own heart. I knew you were a romantic under all that fuzz.”

 _Speak for yourself,_ I laugh internally.

“What were you gonna say?”

Lay it on smooth, I tell myself knowing I am the most un-smooth person I know. I sit up straight, clear my throat, and gesture grandly. “I would have gotten down on one knee, taken your hand in my claws, and told you, ‘Robert Small, there is something I need to tell you. We’ve met maybe four times, I think we’re friends, but I feel as if I’ve known you for months. I can trust you; I feel it in my fangs. My secret identity is this: I’m actually your neighbor.’”

“A powerful revelation. Civilizations have crumbled over less.”

“Friggin tell me about it.”

He chuckles. I twitch reflexively when a warm hand—slightly sandy—cups the back of my neck. My eyelids flutter, and I lean into it without thinking when his thumb grazes my nape in a gentle sweep.

“Don’t skip the part where we’re friends. Drinkin’ buddies, too,” he says, voice gravelly and low. Gravity and a slow pull draw me in close, and my eyes lock onto the sight of his lips barely lit by the sliver of moonlight. “Ain’t lettin’ you forget my boyfriend’s a fuckin’ varúlfur.”

My stomach flips, heart stammers. “As if that was something I could forget.”

He leans in, and with the taste of his breath on my tongue I grab his face in both hands and close the distance between us.

I’ve been thinking it for weeks but never had the gall to say it out loud. Because I’m in my forties—Jesus, that number just isn’t fair—but the thought of calling someone my boyfriend is just. Wow. The butterflies it gives me, I feel like a giddy teenager whose crush just confessed to liking him, too. Because we’re boyfriends and I feel like I’m in grade school just using that word. Because, _damn,_ it’s true and I freaking love it.

His lips move against my own, strong fingers laced in the back of my head, delicately fingering my neck, the tender spot where spine connects with skull. My tongue slides along his teeth, eagerly tasting him when he pulls me in, consumes me. He tastes like smoke, smells of leather and the sea breeze. His hair tickles my nose, pulling me in deep until my leg drops and I face him more fully, arms slinking around his neck. Arms around my back, his fingertips graze the swath of skin where my shirt rides up just a little.

 _“Oh my god, get a room!”_ Amanda shouts.

I break with a snort, but once the laugh starts I can’t stop it. I fall over holding my sides. Robert chuckles, too; although, it’s probably more because of me than Amanda. When I finish laughing, thoroughly covered in sand by then, we stand, brush off, and walk over.

Amanda’s hands are on her hips through her smile, and the mer is grinning like it’s Christmas morning.

“Sorry not sorry,” I say.

The mer chirps and chuckles, tail arcing up high like a scorpion before flopping lazily into the water with an immodest clap.

“And to think,” the mer says, brandishing a grin full of sharkish teeth, “no one had to throw stones this time.”

* * *

Amanda is still shaking out her last polaroid when I pull the car into the driveway. She has a stack of several, but this one is a late bloomer.

“You gotta shake it harder,” Robert instructs as we all pile out onto the driveway. “Like you’re trying to beat the demons out of it.”

“Have at thee!” she exclaims. She shakes the picture hard, and the flapping noise it makes has me thinking she might just lift off the ground. “The power of photography compels you! Aha, there it is!”

She holds the picture up for her own inspection, a broad smile stretching from ear to ear while the outlines of the photo begin coming through. When she suggested taking a selfie with the merman, he readily agreed, and the two posed cheek-to-cheek grinning like fiends. The photo will undoubtedly take its place in the album in her go bag and be shown off proudly at this year’s Christmas reunion. That and the blue, barnacle encrusted bottle cap the mer gifted her in exchange for her driftwood stick.

“Catch you on the inside, Panda. I’m gonna walk this heathen home,” I say, indicating Robert with a thumb over my shoulder.

Amanda looks between us, understanding flashing across her face, and she shoots us with finger guns. “Don’t get lost on your way home, Romeo.”

She clicks her tongue then darts inside, leaving me searing with a full body blush.

Robert is grinning. “She’s a gem.”

“I was thinking ‘incorrigible’ myself, but then that’d make me the one she gets it from.”

He chuckles.

It’s barely a twenty yard walk to his house, but we’re not even off my driveway yet when my hand sidles its way into his. No hesitation this time. His fingers knit with mine, clasping almost possessively, and from the corner of my eye I think I can see his grin widen a little. 

We cut across the Christiansen lawn and immediately arrive in his driveway, his pickup like a sleeping sentinel from a bygone age. We get to his front door, but he doesn’t let go of my hand.

“This the part where you ask to come in for a nightcap? Or meet the folks?” he asks, not even attempting to hide the way his eyes scan me up and down.

Because hey, wow, that reminds me of how this night started off and the pile of unmentionables shoved haphazardly under my bed. And it absolutely does not send a wash of heat down my spine because we could just as easily finish what we started in his bedroom. Or his living room. Or kitchen. Or bathroom. Any flat surface, really. Or it doesn’t even need to be flat. Hell, I don’t even need a surface. I already know I can hold him up. Might pull something, but it’d be mostly healed by morning. And totally worth it.

“As if it’s possible to spend less than five minutes in your home, Robert.” Because there’s no way I’m going in there and leaving without some piece of clothing turned inside out or backward.

Robert laughs, full of mirth and delight. He turns to me fully, takes both my hands, and back steps with me until his back is against the door, arms looped possessively around my middle. Yes. This. I could get used to this. That twinge of nervousness about PDA be damned. Because this is exactly what I want. To be pressed up against him in the early morning hours, nothing between us but two layers of easily discarded clothing. My lungs full of his scent and my nerves livewires under his touch.

“The quickie is an ancient art form, John. Somethin’s gotta be said about fuckin’ someone so good in five minutes they walk bowlegged for an hour. If that’s what you want, I can deliver.” My blush is fiery and impossible to conceal. His hands are equally unsubtle in the places they venture. Under the hem of my shirt, teasing a sliver of exposed skin, the divot at the lowest reaches of my spine; fingering the nape of my neck until I break out in shivering goosebumps. “You ever been pulled over by a bad cop before? Tell you to put your hands on the wall an’ spread ‘em. Get frisked ‘till you can’t see straight. Can’t walk straight, either.”

My jaw tightens as a hot shiver lances from the stem of my spine right down to my cock. “Down, boy.”

Robert erupts with more hearty laughter.

“You make it so hard to wanna be good, Robert.”

“Why be good when you can be bad, baby?”

“Mmm, I know of some vampires who would wholeheartedly agree.”

Robert’s eyes flash with a mountain of interest, but I just smirk and pull him in, kissing him hard. He presses instantly for more, lips merged deeply with mine. Warm breath puffs down the side of my neck, stealing fistfuls of my shirt, lacing firmly with my hair. Teeth raze my lips, tugging and suckling my bottom lip until hot shivers skitter across my skin.

I have to force myself off of him, eyes shut with a laborious groan.

“That . . . might have been a bad idea,” I admit. Since when did my voice get that gravelly?

“Very bad. And so fuckin’ good,” Robert hums. His fingers curl in my shirt and hair, tugging lightly at both as he plants rough kisses all down the side of my neck.

“Take it easy on me, Robert, I gotta walk home,” I half grumble, wanting nothing more than to push into those touches and find out just where it leads us. Preferably with my hands against the wall and a rough voice in my ear telling me to “spread ‘em.”

_Hoooooooo, boy._

But Robert does relent with no further pressing. Not to say he doesn’t look endlessly pleased with himself at my clearly ruffled feathers—and the knowledge I will need a cold shower before I can even think of sleep.

“Thanks for lettin’ me meet that mer tonight,” he says on a lighter note.

“My pleasure. No way in hell was I missing the chance to show off my boyfriend to another cryptid.”

There it is again. The word that has been giving me a serious case of the monarch butterflies all night.

Robert’s brows go up; he smirks. “You wanna show me off, huh?” The way he says it, it seems like he has a little trouble believing it.

“To literally _everything_.”

“Well hell, don’t let me slow you down. Who we meeting next? The Kraken? Jersey Devil? I’m game.”

I can’t help giggling. When I lean in this time, Robert meets me halfway, and the kiss isn’t heated or lusty. It’s light, airy even. His lips move against mine, and my fingers card through his hair. Electricity zips between us, and I shiver.

His eyes are still shut when he breaks, head leaned back against the doorframe. I chuckle; he hums with obvious contentment. Because yeah, that’s right, he’s boyfriends with a motherfucking werewolf.

But when he looks at me again, his brows are furrowed, some kind of thought or worry creeping in.

“What is it?” I ask.

“This doesn’t . . . does this . . . complicate things for you?” Robert asks haltingly. “I mean—with other cryptids. Is us being a thing problematic? The mer seemed okay with it, but. . . . Would other varúlfur . . . ?” He trails off, trusting I will understand.

I do.

The way he says it. Restless and uncertain. Like this is something that’s been bothering him for a while. I wonder if it has. If it has, how long it’s been that way. Because he must be thinking it: if letting the cat out of the bag jeopardizes the kingdom, is treachery punishable by death?

I give him a reassuring smile, hands sliding to gingerly cup his neck. Let some of my warmth bleed into him.

“If you didn’t know about me, it would. I’d be accused of playing with fire. But you do know. More than that, you accept me. You accept all of this. And you’re curious, not frightened. You want to understand. That’s not nothing.” Looking between his eyes, I see some of that uncertainty melt away. Back to that half-smirk as my thumb grazes his cheek and stubble. “You’re ny vinur.”

“And that. What is that? The mer, he looked surprised when Amanda called me that.”

“Oh, that’s—” I pause, thinking hard on the best way to describe this. “It’s. . . . ‘Auf’n vinur.’ That means ‘I’m a friend.’ It’s how cryptids identify humans who know. Amanda is ‘vinur:’ a human born on the cryptid side. She’s adopted, but she knew from the start—is basically one of the big, extended cryptid family. You’re what we call ‘ny vinur.’ It means ‘new friend.’ You weren’t born knowing; you found out. And not in a _I-thought-I-saw-something-kinda-weird-while-camping-once_ way. You _know_. And you can be trusted with knowing. That’s big. And rare. Alex was that way, too.”

It’s a lot to take in, I know. But he listens close and absorbs it all. Wonders, files it away neatly alongside all he’s learned. 

“You absolutely just admitted cryptids think I’m cool,” he says, satisfied beyond reason.

I snort. “Cool as ice, baby.”

“Fuck yeah.”

We both laugh, and we’re still laughing when he kisses me again. Longer this time. I slide my arms around his shoulders, leaning my weight into him as his arms loop more fully around my waist. How our tongues play behind our lips and he lavishes me with soft bites, a noticeable shiver crawling up his spine when I run my fingers over his hair, rub the base of his skull and thumb tender circles into his temples.

I slide back from him, lingering in his kiss as long as I can.

“G’night, John,” he says, looking all too pleased with himself as I step down his porch.

“Good morning, Robert.”

He smirks.

* * *

The hall closet is open, and Amanda’s go bag is unzipped on the floor, its contents spilled halfway into the hall. I peek around the corner and nudge her cracked bedroom door a few inches further open. A light creak announces my intrusion, but Amanda hardly notices.

She’s hunched over her bed scribbling something down. Fresh polaroid photos are strewn about her bed as she sets one down and flips through the crackly pages of an old, tan leather photo album, tucking a fine point sharpie behind her ear. I realize what’s she’s doing and smile.

“Snap anything good?” I ask as I step up next to her, leaning over her collection from tonight.

She jumps (guess she didn’t notice me after all), snatches one of the photos, and pockets it in the most suspicious _you didn’t see anything_ maneuver I’ve witnessed to date.

“I don’t have anything!” she exclaims, red faced with embarrassment.

“Wow, okay. I completely did not even see that picture but now I absolutely have to.”

Amanda takes a small step back, horror in her eyes. “It’s nothing! Really, dad.”

My Dad senses tingle. Intense curiosity rifles through my fur, and maybe a tiny bit perturbed about her determination at keeping something hidden from me. Did she photograph a body? A drug cache? Is there a ghost following her? Following _me_? Has something embarrassing about me been immortalized in film?

Less playful now, “Amanda, what is it?”

She fidgets. Slipping the photo from her pocket, she checks it for creases and looks at it with a tiny smile.

“It’s supposed to be a surprise.”

I blink, back down immediately. “For me?”

She shakes her head. “For Mr. Small.” She shifts on her feet. “And . . . for you, too.”

_Oh, Panda._

My heart flutters, and when she steps back to me I come to stand beside her. She shows me the picture. For a polaroid, it’s remarkably well aimed. How do you even selfie with a polaroid? The film is so expensive! You really only get one or two chances per subject, and it was nighttime to boot.

Two hands are in the foreground of the picture. It’s a little hard to make things out, but the flash illuminates enough to get the point across. One is clearly Amanda’s with her green jacket cuff, and the other is the mer’s webbed, scaly, wet blue-green hand. The two hands are pressed together, their four fingers and thumbs linked in the symmetrical curves of a heart, and it’s then I notice what is in the empty space the heart makes. 

It’s . . . me and Robert. Kissing farther up the beach.

I blush so brightly I almost don’t notice what’s written on the white block at the bottom:

> _“Part of your woooorld~!!”_

“Oh my god, dad, please don’t cry.”

“You’ve done it. I am absolutely going to cry.” My eyes are stinging as I feel moisture beading in the corners. I rub my eye to dispel it, but it does nothing, only spreads the moisture around. “Amanda, this. . . . This is so cute, honey. And sweet. A little creepy, like you were camping out waiting to snap this, but it’s so cute. I love it. Robert will love it, too. I doubt he’d admit it, but I know he would.”

A small hand lights on the middle of my back. I look at her, and she’s smiling gently, on the verge of her own tears thanks to mine.

“You gonna be okay, Pops?” she asks.

I nod, sniff back what liquids I can, and dab my eyelids with the hem of my shirt. Oh god, I’m so uncool. 

“Yeah. Yeah, I’m good. Think I just need some rest. I’m operating in the negatives I think.”

“You go do that. I’m gonna finish up here and crash too, that okay?” she says.

It is. I can’t even bring myself to pull the past-your-curfew card to get her to go to bed, too. If she wants to stay up, she can. How she has the energy, I’ll never understand. It’s been a night. 

An incredible night.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Please imagine Amanda and the mer taking selfies and getting photobombed by John and Robert kissing in the background tHE MER GETS SUPER HYPED AND HE’S BLURRY IN ALL THE PHOTOS BECAUSE HE IS ABSOLUTELY THE SAME ONE WHO THREW THE ROCK BACK AND JOHN AND ROBERT ARE OTP


End file.
